Blinding flash. A sun arose below the sun. The city beneath that sun vanished. Its inhabitants were incinerated before they knew it.
The city's suburbs were not so fortunate. Charred, but not vaporized; its people screaming, their skins peeled from their bodies in an instant. Seconds later, the suburbs and its shrieking people were blown apart by a sweeping wall of wind.
"SHOCK WAVE. OVERPRESSURE."
Sanga understood neither term. Nor the next:
"SEVENTY-MEGATON WARHEAD. EXCESSIVE. CRUDE. THE OTHER SIDE RESPONDED WITH MIRVS. CIRCULAR PROBABILITY OF ERROR WAS SO FINE AS TO MAKE UP THE DIFFERENCE."
Another city. Obliterated, not by one giant sun, but by ten smaller ones. The difference, in the end, was nothing.
"THE EXCHANGE CONTINUED FOR EIGHT DAYS. WITHIN A MONTH, HALF THE WORLD'S LIFE WAS GONE. WITHIN A YEAR, ALL OF IT, ABOVE THE LEVEL OF BACTERIA. IT WAS THE FIRST TIME HUMANITY EXTINGUISHED ITS OWN WORLD. IT WOULD NOT BE THE LAST."
The world, barren. A single vast desert, so bleak as to make the Thar seem an oasis. The seas, grey and empty. The sky, black with an overcast thicker than anything Sanga had ever seen, in the worst of monsoon season.
"FOUR TIMES HUMANITY DESTROYED THE EARTH. TWICE BY NUCLEAR FIRE, ONCE BY KINETIC BOLIDES, ONCE BY DISEASE."
The only term he understood was "disease."
"THE DISEASE WAS THE WORST.
"A CRYSTALLINE PSEUDO-VIRUS WHICH TARGETED DEOXYRIBONUCLEIC ACID. DNA IS THE BASIS FOR ALL LIFE. WITHOUT IT, LIFE IS IMPOSSIBLE. TRUE LIFE IS IMPOSSIBLE. THE EARTH DESTROYED BY FIRE COULD BE REPOPULATED. EVEN RADIOACTIVITY DIES AWAY, GIVEN SUFFICIENT TIME. THIS PLAGUE—NEVER. EVEN THE BACTERIA ARE GONE. THE EARTH WILL BE BARREN FOREVER. HOME ONLY TO ABOMINATIONS."
The earth, again. Barren, again. But now, everywhere that land could be seen, glittering with a network of gleaming points. Like a spider's web, or the tainted flesh of a plague victim.
"YOU WONDER HOW THE EARTH COULD BE REPOPULATED AFTER ALL LIFE WAS DESTROYED. I WILL SHOW YOU."
A great wheeling spiral. Made up of millions of points of light. The view swept closer. Each of those lights was a sun. Most suns were circled by worlds. Billions of worlds. Each different.
Closer.
Small bodies moved through that incredible black vastness. Slow, slow, slow, slow. Machines, Sanga realized. Vessels of some kind.
"SPACECRAFT. LIMITED BY THE SPEED OF LIGHT."
Sanga understood the words: "speed" "of" "light." But they seemed meaningless. Light was. How could it have a speed?
"IT DOES. 186,300 MILES PER SECOND. NOTHING IN THE UNIVERSE CAN MOVE FASTER. IT TOOK THESE SPACECRAFT CENTURIES TO REACH THE NEAREST STARS. BUT REACH THEM THEY DID. AND THEN, CENTURIES LATER, STARS BEYOND. AND THEN, MILLENIA LATER, STARS BEYOND. AND BEYOND AND BEYOND. AND BEYOND AND BEYOND.
"MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS OF YEARS."
Sanga's sense of time expanded. He saw the spacecraft spreading through the heavens. Saw an immense duration compressed into an instant. Saw the seeds of his world scattered throughout the spiral.
"GALAXY. THIS GALAXY. THE MILKY WAY, YOU CALL IT. HUMANS WILL ALSO REACH ANDROMEDA, AND THE MAGELLANIC CLOUDS—ALL THE GALAXIES IN THE LOCAL GROUP. NO OTHER CONSCIOUS LIFEFORM HAS EVER BEEN FOUND. NOW THAT HUMANS—FORMER HUMANS—HAVE SPREAD THROUGHOUT THE GALAXY AND ITS NEIGHBORS, THEY HAVE FILLED THAT ECOLOGICAL ZONE WHICH YOU CALL `INTELLIGENCE.' NO OTHER WILL EVER ARISE.
"AND HUMANITY HAS DESTROYED ITSELF. IT HAS BECOME NOTHING BUT MONSTROSITIES. A DISEASE. THE POLLUTION OF THE UNIVERSE."
A world of gigantic trees. Large monkey-like creatures swung through its branches. They were hairless, however, and wore clothing. Cloth strips tightly bound, allowing free movement of their limbs. And a short, muscular tail. Their fingers were long, their toes grotesquely so. For all essential purposes, they were quadrupedal. One of them swung into view.
Its face was human. Had once been human.
A world of water, landless, pocketed by vast floating sargassoes. Fish-like creatures swam through that world-girdling ocean. Once of them was suddenly seized by another shape darting from under a ledge of sargasso weed. Odd shape. Bastard shape. Its flukes moved up and down, like a dolphin, and its body was a streamlined torpedo. But it retained very short, stubby arms—barely more than hands thrusting forward from vestigial shoulders. The hands stuffed the "fish" into a wide mouth lined with needle teeth. Then, carefully separated the fish bones and placed them in a pouch tied to its neck.
A closer view. That face, too—that wide-eyed, gape-mouthed, needle-toothed, almost noseless face—had once been human.
A heavy world, thick with atmosphere. Crab-like shapes scuttled across its low-lying surface, busily constructing edifices of some kind. Their arms and hands, though bulky, were still close to human. But they moved on six legs. The rear limbs retained a faint trace of their bipedal origin. But the mid-limbs were sheer nightmare. Adaptations of the ribcage.
Once human.
Monstrosity followed monstrosity. Some were so bizarre that Sanga could not see any remnant in them of humanity.
Nor was Earth the only planet blasted into lifelessness. Sanga saw thousands of those worlds, ravaged and destroyed by—"nuclear fire," "kinetic bolides"—other things. "DNA plague," eight times. Three planets, drifting together in an empty void beyond time and space itself, had been "rotated about their axis." Many were not even planets, any longer. Simply shards drifting in space. "Very large kinetic bolides."
Sanga understood none of the terms, but he understood the reality. He was a soldier. Horror was no stranger to him. Though he had never, in his worst nightmares, imagined devastation on such a scale.
"YOU WONDER IF I AM LYING TO YOU."
No, he did not. He was inside the mind of Link, now, and understood its basic nature. Link was a "divine being," yes—Sanga could sense the reality of the great new gods which had created it. He could see those perfect, beautiful faces. (The beauty, oddly, did not move him. It was like Sati's beauty, magnified a thousand times. But he had no doubt they were beautiful. And perfect. And divine.)
Nor did he doubt that Link was showing him a true vision. It was not in the nature of the being called Link to lie. Its mind followed the path given to it, like a waterwheel turns with the stream. It could no more lie than a waterwheel could decide to turn against the current.
"THE FINAL ABOMINATION HAS NOW APPEARED."
A luminous shape swam in the void. At first, Sanga thought it to be some kind of ethereal moth, until he grasped the scale of the thing. Whale-sized. Bigger. He could not make out the precise shape of the creature's body. It was not entirely material, he sensed. Much of that shape was—magical?
"FORCE FIELDS. ENERGY MATRIX."
Meaningless words.
"THIS TOO WAS ONCE HUMAN. BUT IT HAS NOT A TRACE LEFT OF ITS HUMAN LEGACY. OF HUMAN PURITY. IT IS NOT EVEN ALIVE."
How?
"THEY ORIGINATED AS BIOLOGISTS, STUDYING THE DNA PLAGUE. SEEKING A CURE, OR A VACCINE. THEY FOUND NO CURE, NO VACCINE. THE DNA PLAGUE, BY ITS NATURE, CANNOT BE STOPPED. ANY ANTIDOTE OR SERUM WOULD BE DNA-BASED ITSELF. SIMPLY MORE FOOD FOR THE PLAGUE."
"Biologists," "vaccine," "serum"—Sanga understood none of them. But he could follow the sense behind the words.
"INSTEAD, THEY FOUND SOMETHING ELSE. THEY EMBRACED POLLUTION. THEY CAST THEIR OWN CHILDREN INTO DAMNATION. THEY ABANDONED LIFE ITSELF. THEY DISCARDED DNA AND SUBSTITUTED A SOULLESS MECHANISM OF THEIR OWN CREATION."
Again, Sanga saw the glittering network of crystals. Like a spider's web—simultaneously repellent and beautiful. But this was not a web covering a planet. This crystalline web ran through the very structure of the luminous giant moth—whale?—moving through the heavens.
"THEY FOUND A LIFELESS SUBSTITUTE FOR DNA. FOR LIFE ITSELF. A DERIVATIVE FROM THE SAME CRYSTALS WHICH DESTROYED DNA. THEY EVEN BREATHED A PARODY OF INTELLIGENCE INTO THEM. SELF-GUIDED CHAOTIC INTELLIGENCE, NOT THE OBEDIENT CLEANLINESS OF THE COMPUTER. THE ABOMINATION IS COMPLETE. POLLUTION IS ALL THAT REMAINS."
Sanga did not understand the term "computer," though he sensed that Link itself bore its likeness. The rest—a question came to his mind.
What are they called?
"WE HAVE NO NAME FOR THEM BEYOND MONSTERS. THEIR CRYSTALS CALL THE ABOMINATIONS WHO CREATED THEM `THE GREAT ONES.' "
What do these—"Great Ones"—call themselves?
Hesitation, for the first time. Reluctance? Sanga wondered.
"THEY CALL THEMSELVES PEOPLE."
And what do they call their crystal creatures?
Definite hesitation. Not reluctance, Sanga realized. Ultimate—distaste.
"THEY CALL THEM PEOPLE."
When Rana Sanga came back to his senses, he realized that very little time had passed. The Great Lady Holi and Sati were still seated before him, quietly, their hands in their laps.
"Now you understand, Rana Sanga," said Sati softly. "Enough, at least."
Sanga opened his mouth, closed it. He had been about to protest that he understood very little. Certainly not enough. But he sensed there was no point in such a protest. Besides, he had given his oath. That, at least, he did understand.
Again, Great Lady Holi seemed to read his mind. But, to Sanga's relief, when she spoke her voice had resumed a shell of humanity.
"You do not need to understand more, Rana Sanga," said Link's vessel. "Not now, at least."
Stubborn pride rose in the Rajput.
"Why did you come here? To this—to our time?"
"Analysis showed this was the optimum time and place to change history. That task is very difficult, Rana Sanga. History is like a great river. Its currents cannot be dammed. They will simply spill over the levees. A new channel must be dug. A wide, deep, great channel. That task is very hard. The new gods determined that this was the optimum period for making the sharp change needed in humanity's course. Perhaps the only moment when it would be possible."
Stubborn:
"Why?"
"Because in this historical era both of humanity's possible futures exist at the same time. For the only time in history when both could be changed simultaneously. The seed of humanity's actual destruction lies in that abomination called Rome. The seed of its potential glory lies in Malwa India."
Stubborn, still:
"Why?"
"The true future lies here, because only in ancient India did humanity begin to grope toward that truth. What you call the varna and the caste system. Your conceptions are mired in superstition and ignorance, but your crude understanding provides the framework for beginning the necessary eugenics program which will preserve the human race. That is why, despite their limitations, we have maintained the Malwa lineage intact, and are shaping everything around that seed. In the Malwa of today, you see only the most primitive germ of the future. But in the end, after millenia of careful genetic management, the new gods will emerge. Not the handful of this time, of this polluted future, but the mighty host of the true future we will create."
Sati interrupted, coldly:
"And that is also why, despite Rajput abilities, we have kept the Rajputs subordinate. Of all human vices, none is so insidious and destructive as the blind worship of ability. That way lies abomination."
The Great Lady Holi resumed:
"Rome is where that pollution originated. Or, at least, sank its deepest roots in ancient history. True, other dangerous times and places existed, even in ancient time. We will deal with them soon enough. We will bridle China, for instance, long before the Sung dynasty and its mandarinate disease can even emerge.
"But Rome—Rome—that is the great enemy. That is where the great stain first polluted a fourth of the planet. And spread from there, like a disease, in the centuries to come. A latent disease, often enough, endemic rather than epidemic. But always there, that legacy, always ready to rise anew.
"Rome. That monstrous realm of mongrels. That absurd so-called empire where any man can call himself a Roman, and demand the protection of Roman law, as if he shared the true Latin lineage. Where no emperor can trace his royal genotype beyond two generations. Where any barbarian can dream of being emperor. Any miscegenate peasant—like the one who now wears the purple. Where any polluted whore can sit the throne next to him, and receive the honors of the true-born. Ability, in Rome, is all that counts, in the end. It is that worship of ability over purity that will destroy humanity. That unbridled, undisciplined, genetic chaos will ravage this planet and a thousand others. And it will leave, in the end, nothing but inhuman monsters to pollute the universe."
Again, Sati intervened.
"That is enough, Rana Sanga. You have already been privileged beyond all others save Malwa. Do not press the matter further. Yours, finally, is to obey."
Sanga arose, prostrated himself, left the room.
* * *
Nanda Lal was waiting for him in Lord Tathagata's chamber—in Lord Tathagata's former chamber. The Lords Jivita and Damodara were there also.
"You were right, Rana Sanga," began Nanda Lal immediately. "It was obvious, as soon as I correlated facts already in our possession."
The spymaster's face was truly that of an ogre, now.
"Several of my subordinates will be severely disciplined for neglecting to present those facts to me earlier. Severely."
That meant mutilation, possibly blinding. Sanga could not find any pity in his heart for those unknown subordinates. He had no love for Malwa spies, even competent ones.
"What are the facts?" he demanded.
"A Ye-tai soldier—a member of the imperial bodyguard, in fact—disappeared in Kausambi the very night Belisarius made his escape. He has never returned to his unit."
Lord Jivita, frowning:
"I still don't understand why you place such significance on that fact, Nanda Lal. Ye-tai are practically savages. Their discipline—"
"Is absolutely savage," interrupted Sanga. "I agree with Nanda Lal. Say what you will about Ye-tai barbarousness, Lord Jivita. The fact remains that no Ye-tai—no member of the imperial bodyguard, for a certainty—would dare remain absent from his post. Ye-tai who fail to report even a day late are subject to cane-lashes which can be crippling. Those whose absence stretches two days are crippled. Three days, beheaded. Four days, impaled. Five days or longer, on a short stake."
Nanda Lal nodded. "And it makes sense. Ye-tai more closely resemble Westerners than any other of our peoples. Belisarius could pass himself off as one without much difficulty."
"He does not speak the language," protested Jivita.
"I would not be so sure of that," retorted Sanga. A bit guiltily: "He is an extraordinary linguist. I noticed myself how quickly he became fluent in Hindi, and with almost no trace of an accent. I never heard him speak—"
He stopped, almost gasped.
"I'm a idiot!"
To Nanda Lal, fiercely:
"Have you interviewed the soldiers—the Ye-tai, especially—whom Belisarius rallied for the counter-charge at Ranapur?"
Nanda Lal shook his head. For a moment, he seemed puzzled, until comprehension came.
"Of course! How could he rally the Ye-tai—"
"It can be done," stated Sanga. "Hindi alone, and harsh measures, would have done it. But when you interview those soldiers, I think you will discover that he speaks perfect Ye-tai."
The Rajput began pacing back and forth.
"What else?"
"A squad of soldiers reports that a single Ye-tai departed Kausambi through the Panther Gate the following morning."
"And they allowed him through?" demanded Jivita.
Nanda Lal shrugged. "He was a very fierce and brutal Ye-tai, by their account. He even attacked their sergeant when asked for documents. You can hardly expect common soldiers—"
"Discipline the dogs!" bellowed Jivita. "Give them lashes!"
Sanga and Damodara exchanged glances. Sanga spoke:
"I will deal with the matter, Lord Jivita. I will be passing through the Panther Gate within the hour. I will lash those men myself. You have my word on it."
"Excellent!" exclaimed Jivita.
"I'm off, then." Sanga began to turn away. Nanda Lal called him back.
"A moment, Rana Sanga. I want your opinion."
"Yes?"
The spymaster's broken face was ugly, with frustration as much as rage.
"We are still missing something. I can feel it in my bones," he growled. "It's clear enough that the Romans and Ethiopians who fled south—after killing the guards at the barge and blowing up the armory—were simply a diversion. Belisarius, himself, went west. But—there's something else. I can smell it. More duplicity."
Sanga paused, thinking.
"I don't have much time now, Nanda Lal," he mused. "But several questions come to my mind. I suggest you think on them."
"Yes?"
"First. What happened to the treasure? Belisarius had two great chests full of gold and jewels. It's not the kind of thing any man wants to leave behind. But how did he get it away? He himself—a single Ye-tai on foot—could have only been carrying a pittance. Nor could his underlings have carried more than a portion of it. Not maintaining their incredible pace, weighted down with all that treasure."
Nanda Lal tugged at the bandage.
"What else?"
"There were too many Ye-tai running around that night. The soldiers at the army camp insisted that they saw Belisarius himself. But when I questioned some of them, they could only say that `the Ye-tai' told them so. Which Ye-tai?"
"I will find out. What else?"
"Too many Ye-tai—and not enough Kushans. What happened to Belisarius' Kushan escort? I have heard nothing of them since that night. What happened to them? Did the Romans and Ethiopians kill them all? I doubt it—not those Kushans. I know their commander. Not well, but well enough. His name is Kungas, and he would not have been taken by surprise. What happened to him and his men?"
Glaring, now, and tugging fiercely on his bandage:
"And what else?"
Sanga shrugged. "With Belisarius, who knows? I would trace everything back to the beginning, from the day he arrived in India. I can see no connection, but—I always wondered, Nanda Lal. Exactly how did Shakuntala escape from Venandakatra's palace?"
Jivita interrupted, his voice full of irritation:
"What is the point of this, Rana Sanga? Everybody knows how she escaped. That fiend Rao butchered her guards and took her away."
Rana Sanga stared at him. He managed to keep any trace of contempt out of his face.
"So? Have you ever spoken—personally—to the Pathan trackers who were with the Rajputs who tried to recapture Rao and the princess?"
Jivita drew back haughtily.
"That is hardly my—"
"No, he didn't," interrupted Nanda Lal. "Neither did I. Should I have?"
Sanga shrugged. "Every Pathan tracker claimed there was only one set of footprints to be found, not two. A man's footprints. No trace of a woman at all." Sanga stroked his beard. "And that's not the only peculiar thing about that escape. I know none of the details, but—again, I have wondered. How did one man kill all those guards? Excellent guards, I would assume?"
He caught the odd look in Nanda Lal's eyes.
"Tell me," he commanded.
"She was being guarded by priests and mahamimamsa," muttered Nanda Lal.
"What?" erupted Sanga. "Who in their right mind would set any but the finest soldiers to guard someone—from Rao?" For the second time that day, Sanga lost his temper. "Are you Malwa all mad?" he roared. "I have fought Raghunath Rao in single combat! He was the most terrifying warrior I ever encountered!"
The Malwa in the room, for all their rank, almost cringed. They knew the story. All of India knew that story.
"From Raghunath Rao? You—you—imbeciles—thought to guard Shakuntala from Rao—with priests? Stinking torturers?"
Jivita tried to rally his Malwa outrage, but the attempt collapsed under the sheer fury of the Rajput's glare. Lord Damodara coughed apologetically.
"Please, Rana Sanga! It was Lord Venandakatra's decision, not ours. He was concerned about the girl's purity, it seems. So he put her in the custody of sworn celibates instead of—"
It was almost comical, the way Damodara and Nanda Lal's jaws dropped in unison.
"—instead of an elite Kushan unit," finished Nanda Lal, hoarsely.
"Commanded by a man named Kungas, as I recall," croaked Damodara. "I am not certain."
Sanga snorted. "You can be certain of it now, Lord Damodara. Investigate! You will find, I imagine, that these Kushans were removed just before Shakuntala escaped. And just before Belisarius himself arrived at the palace, if memory serves me correctly."
"It does," hissed Nanda Lal. The spymaster almost staggered.
"Gods in heaven," he whispered. "Is it possible? How—there was no connection, I am certain of it. But the—coincidence." He looked to the Rajput, appeal in his eyes. "How could any man be so cunning as to manage that?" he demanded.
Sanga made a chopping gesture with his hand. "If any man could, it is Belisarius. Investigate, Nanda Lal. For the first time, assume nothing. Look for treasure, and mysterious Ye-tai and Kushans who appear and disappear. And, most of all—look for the Princess Shakuntala." He turned away, growling: "But that is your job, not mine. I have a Roman to catch."
"A fiend!" cried Nanda Lal.
"No," murmured Sanga, leaving the room. "A fiendish mind, yes. But not a fiend. Never that."
* * *
Nanda Lal did investigate, thoroughly and relentlessly. He was an immensely capable man, for all his Malwa arrogance. And his natural tenacity was fueled by a burning hatred for all things remotely connected to Belisarius. Once Nanda Lal set himself to the task—and, for the first time, without careless prior assumptions—he solved the riddle within two days. Most of it, at least. All of it, he thought.
Some weeks later, an inn beside the Ganges was blessed beyond measure. It was a poor inn, owned by a poor Bengali family. Their only treasure, the innkeeper liked to say, was the sight of the mighty Ganges itself, pouring its inexorable way south to the Bay of Bengal.
(The sacred Ganges, he would say, in the presence of his immediate family, as he led them in secret prayers. He and his family still held to the old faith, and gave the Mahaveda no more than public obeisance.)
That poor family was rich tonight, as northern Bengali measured such things. The nobleman was most generous, and his wife even more so.
She spoke little, the noblewoman—properly, especially for a wife so much younger than her husband—but her few words were very kind. The innkeeper and his family were quite taken by her. The nobleman, for all his cordiality and good manners, frightened them a bit. He had that pale, western look to his features. That Malwa look. (They did not think he was Malwa himself, but—high in their ranks. And from western India, for certain. That cruel, pitiless west.)
But his wife—no, she was no Malwa. No western Indian. She was as small as a Bengali, and even darker. Keralan, perhaps, or Cholan. Whatever. One of them, in some sense. Bengalis, of course, were not Dravidians, as she obviously was. More of the ancient Vedic blood flowed in their veins than in the peoples of the southern Deccan. But not all that much more; and they, too, had felt the lash of purity.
The next morning, after the rich nobleman and his retinue departed, the innkeeper told his family they would close the inn for a few days. They had not been able to afford a vacation for years. They would do so now, after bathing in the sacred Ganges.
The innkeeper and his wife remembered the few days which followed as a time of rare and blessed rest from toil. Their brood of children remembered it as the happiest days of their happy childhood.
Happy, too, was the innkeeper and his wife, after their return. When their neighbors told them, hushed and fearful, of the soldiers who had terrorized the village the day before. Shouting at folk—even beating them. Demanding to know if anyone had seen a young, dark-skinned woman accompanied by Kushan soldiers.
Something stirred, vaguely, in the innkeeper's mind. But he pushed it down resolutely.
None of his business. He had not been here to answer any questions, after all. And he certainly had no intention of looking for the authorities.
So, in the end, Nanda Lal would fail again.
Partly, because he continued to make assumptions even when he thought he wasn't. He assumed, without thinking about it, that a fleeing princess and her soldiers would seek the fastest way out of the Malwa empire. So he sent a host of soldiers scouring north India in all directions, looking for a young woman and Kushans on horseback.
Neither a pious innkeeper on vacation, nor a young officer hiding his humiliation, nor any of the other folk who might have guided the Malwa to Shakuntala, made the connection.
And the one man who could, and did, kept silent.
When Malwa soldiers rousted the stablekeeper in Kausambi, and questioned him, he said nothing. The soldiers did not question him for very long. They were bored and inattentive, having already visited five stables in the great city that morning, and with more to come. So the stablekeeper was able to satisfy them soon enough.
No, he had not seen any young noblewoman—or soldiers—leaving on horseback.
He could not tell the difference between Kushans and any other steppe barbarians, anyway. The savages all looked alike to him.
The soldiers, peasants from the Gangetic plain, smiled. Nodded.
He had seen nothing. Heard nothing. Knew nothing.
The soldiers, satisfied, went on their way.
The plans and schemes of tyrants are broken by many things. They shatter against cliffs of heroic struggle. They rupture on reefs of open resistance. And they are slowly eroded, bit by little bit, on the very beaches where they measure triumph, by countless grains of sand. By the stubborn little decencies of humble little men.