Mutiny in Space (15 page)

But Hanna would not yield by the breadth of a tan’s tary code of warrior honor, a code both incredibly involved and brutally simple. And she, the Dame, the High Keeper of the King’s Castles, and head of Sept Sartissa, was the epitome of that code. To all Jory’s urging and entreaty, she continued to say, “No.”

All next day, as they circled the Dales, he kept up his persuasion. But he could not persuade her by an ell. Word of their coming had preceded them; they were met, at last, by her white palanquin — not the same in which she had been captured, but another — and a corps of warriors. While they stayed, prostrate, in the dust of the road, she turned to Jory.

“Warlock,” she said, “you are not without courage of your own. I am not without gratitude. I wish there were some way … But you are men, and men of a strange people. While you are here the land can know no rest. It would be best if you made your escape from this world while I, who am and must be your enemy, am engaged against this other warlock who is both your enemy and mine.”

She mounted to her seat. He took hold of a corner of it. “There is still truce between us for the balance of the week,” he reminded her.

She nodded. She had covered her cropped hair with her battle-mask, thrown back. Once again she sat, as he had first seen her, erect and expressionless. “Your coming has caused a disruption in the proper order of things which may not be set right for a hundred years. The balance of the week remains for our truce. And when it is over — warlock, beware.”

The bearers swung the great palanquin to their shoulders. The corps of warriors rose from the dust. The procession swung off. Jory did not remain to watch them out of sight. His craft, his scheme, his venture into the enemy’s camp, his rescue of the native leader most hostile to him — all, seemingly, had come to naught — or worse. It now remained to be seen how much he could do with the little time that was left.

All along the way back to the Holy Court he passed messengers running with the news. Blaise Darnley had attacked here — attacked there — destroyed this place — burned that one…. The smoke of his destructions rose between land and sky almost wherever one looked. So far, he still returned to the ship after each foray. Jory felt that he himself must do whatever he could before Darnley made his base of operations outside
Persephone
. When that occurred, he knew no further chance of the ship’s leaving planet Valentine would exist, for the invader would by then fully have committed himself to remain.

A familiar but long-unseen face awaited him at the Court — Crammer. The manufacture of the necessary fuel had succeeded, the pettyboat had left its island and was now set down on the northern part of the scrublands, where — for the time being, at least — it would be safe from any attack.

“I wanted to get to see something of the place before we leave, Mr. Cane,” Crammer said. “So Captain Rond let me bring the word while he and Lockharn stayed there with the boat. Locky, he’s tickled silly. All he talks about is how he’s going to pension out and buy that farm.”

Levvis, Mars, Duston and Storm gathered around, unsmiling. They returned Cane’s greetings in subdued tones. Rahan — Little Joe — was there, and so was O-Narra. Her embrace had been brief.

One word kept repeating itself. Jory quoted it now.
“ ‘Leave?’
The Captain is ready to leave?”

Crammer nodded, handed Jory the official communiqué which Captain Marrus Rond had given him for delivery. Jory scanned it quickly. It was in the officialese which Rond had reverted to, now that some semblance of the old order was within his reach once more.

But it all was contained in one word —

Leave
.

“Mr. Cane,” said Levvis, somberly, “if the Old Man really tries to enforce that order, well, I’m awfully sorry, but I guess there’ll be another mutiny.”

Mars said, “And this time he can have the pettyboat all to himself. Or — well, anyway,
I’m
not going. Are you?”

Storm, to whom he had spoken, shook his head. “I joined for adventure. Where is there more of it than here? Besides …” His voice trailed away as he turned to take the hand of the young woman who had come up to him, silently.

“Same thing with me, same with Levvis. Same thing with you — isn’t it, Mr. Cane?” Duston asked.

O-Narra said nothing. She just looked at him. And Rahan-Joe said, “A mistake. Rond-Father will not leave us.”

Turning to Crammer, Jory said, “This matter can’t be done via proxy. Tell the Captain that we’ll have to speak to him, personally. Here. No — wait. Don’t put it like that. Say that protocol requires he take personal farewell of King Mukanahan, and that we’ll wait for him here.”

Crammer nodded, slowly. “I’ll tell him, Mr. Cane. But … look. You fellows can do as you like. You been out here all this time, you made contacts, put down roots. I haven’t. I just stayed there on the island, like I was told. Maybe if I’d been in your place — but I wasn’t. So I’m going back. So is Locky, so’s Captain Rond. I don’t know how long it will take is. We’ll have to zigzag, planet-hop, before we get to a Guild ship or installation. But we’ll get back.

“And when we do, we make our report. You know it will have to be a true one — we couldn’t take the chance of faking it and being found out. What happens then? Maybe now, maybe after a while, the Directorate starts looking. Mainly, they’ll be looking for Per
sephone
. And they’ll be looking for Darnley and his men — but they’ll be looking for
you
, too.” He paused, his next words striking home. “From their point of view there might not be any difference.”

Crammer’s departure left them silent and somber. Then, said Mars, “We could hide out. Maybe they wouldn’t stick around to find us.”

“Maybe,” said Levvis.

“And if they did, maybe they’d just cashier us, cancel pension, turn us loose.”

And, once more, “Maybe.” Nobody voiced what everybody knew — that mutiny or desertion might merit “such penalties and punishment as the court may see fit to direct”; that courts in the past had fired mutineers out the space-locks, marooned them on the lifeless moons of Halcyon
beta
, sentenced deserters to life in the vast frozen prison camp which was the southern Polar hemisphere of Trismegistus. Rahan-Joe did not know any of this, but he drew close to Levvis and embraced his arm, and some of the women began to weep.

Jory said, “I will talk with Captain Rond. This isn’t a cut-and-dried situation. Maybe I can persuade him to put you … us … on detached duty here, indefinite term.”

Once again someone said,
“Maybe …”

The different tone, this time — doubt, warning, menace — brought Jory’s head up with a snap. “I hope no one has ideas of offering any violence to the Commanding Officer,” he said. The others looked at him, and then, silently, the group broke up.

Darnley against everyone, the Dame against all off-planet men, the pettyboat crew against Darnley and the Dame, and now — it seemed — Mars, Storm, Levvis and Duston against Rond and Crammer and Lockharn — and with Jory Cane right in the middle.

• • •

“Why must you go?” O-Narra said, stroking his face. Jory took her hand and kissed it.

In a low, troubled voice, he said, “It is the law, the code we live by. You should know. It isn’t much different from your own.”

She made the gesture of negation. “My own? Code and law? That of the warriors, the Great Ladies? No, Jory, not my own. Not since the day you fired the smoking brand which brought me down and killed my sword. Sword-Narra had a code and a law. O-Narra has neither. She has only Jory.”

They sat in an embrasure in a stone porch extending the length of one of the courtyards. Long crimson
lo
pods grew from the blue-green leafy trees, and some tiny creature whose skin blended in with leaf and bark sang and trilled in the branches. The air was cool and fresh and smelled a little of wet dust and a little of the spicy odor of the
lo
pods.

“ ‘
The great men rule in equity,
’ ” she quoted the ancient old hedge-priestess of the outlaw band to him. “How can this be if you leave us?”

Jory’s smile was wry. He got up, lifted her to her feet. Her pale skin, jade-green eyes, and red-gold hair seemed beautiful beyond his capacity to say her nay. “The rest of the prophecy hasn’t been fulfilled, either. I don’t know, O-Narra. Not yet. But I’m going to find out … not about that old daddy’s tale of a prophecy, but about myself. And what I have to do. Come.”

They walked together through the courts, beautiful from a thousand years of enforced peace, to where Rond awaited them. Crammer was with him. Levvis, Storm, Mars, stood apart. Lockharn was not there. Captain Rond wore a fresh uniform, which bore the golden circles of his rank. He straightened as Jory came up.

“You are out of uniform, First Officer,” he said stiffly. “Sir.”

“However … what is this you have to say to me?”

Jory said it. He asked Rond if they could not stay and assist the people of the Great North Land against the constantly increasing depredations of the mutineers.

“Unfortunately, no,” was his answer. “It is against Guild policy to become embroiled in local affairs, and I could hardly claim in justification that we were trying to regain the main ship. Excuse me — ”

He flicked his finger against the pectoral communicator, raised Lockharn, directed him to start the pettyboat and put her down in the great meadow south of the Holy Court.

“And, Lockharn, go easy. Don’t strain the engines. We have a long, long trip ahead of us. — No, First Officer, I couldn’t permit risking the men, the pettyboat, or
Persephone
herself. The Directorate may well want to attempt recovery of the main ship, you know. Besides the hull and the engines, the cargo, I believe, is still intact. Six men-of-war with the new force-field units could probably recover her, intact.”

Jory started to play his last card. “Then, sir — ”

Lockharn’s voice broke in. “ — terrible, that’s terrible! Captain? Do you know what they’re
do
ing?” He sounded on the verge of tears. “Not only have they burned the crops, those dirty dogs in
Persephone
, but they’ve poisoned the fields! I can
see
it! They’ll never bear any more — it’s not
right
to treat farmland that way!”

“Systemsman, don’t use the communicator unless ordered to.”

“But, Captain — ”

Jory broke in. “Then, sir, since Guild ships will be coming this way, couldn’t you leave the rest of us here on detached duty, indefinite term, as observers? You and Crammer and Lockharn could manage the pettyboat quite well.”

Rond’s look was frosty. “Mr. Cane, you and every other man who has formed a liason knew full well that it had to be of a temporary nature. I cannot — ”

Lockharn’s voice burst out once more, with, “Oh, my God! There won’t be anyone left alive here if this goes on! Ruins, poisoned fields, fire and smoke, all around. And I can see
Persephone!
Her ramp is down and there’s a whole mob on it, probably getting ready to go out and kill more innocent people!”

Rond ordered him off the air, but the man swept on, unheedingly, describing the devastation on all sides. Then he broke off to say, “Red … miles and miles of it … Oh! They must be out in full force — the septs! This is
awful
. Blaise will just wipe them out … and even if they won, they’d just put things back like before. That’s not right, either. Every man ought to own his own farm — ”

Rond spoke, sharply, while Lockharn was still speaking, and against the background of a new sound … one which Jory could not identify. Not until both Rond and Lockharn fell silent, not till then did he recognize it; but even before then it made the little hairs on his flesh stand on end.

Harsh, high, flat, and strident, it resolved itself into a voice, a voice saying over and over again,
“Attack! Attack! Attack! I order you to attack! Crewmen, off the ramp! Off the ramp! Down on the ground! Do you hear me? Those are my orders! Blaise Darnley’s! Blaise Darnley orders you! Blaise Darnley is God! Attack! Attack! At — ”

Rond, Jory, all the men, were struck silent. The voice had utterly ceased to be human. It was madness incarnate. Rond was the first to recover his voice. “Lockharn!” he cried. “Can you hear me?”

“Yes, sir — ”

“Full speed here! Belay the previous orders — get here as quick as you can and get us out of here before that madman destroys all of us!”

In the silence it seemed to Jory that he could hear and identify the heavy breathing of each individual man.
Terrible!
Lockharn was correct in that, all right, and in his summing up the choice of evils. No one could wish Darnley victorious, but — supposing the unlikely — that the septs should win, what then? Why, then, back to the rule by the aristocracy of women warriors, rule by sept and fief and high-born, sword-born Lady; the peasants bound to their plow and the servitors to their task, forever, forever, with ceaseless endeavor, toiling for others.

He was interrupted again. The voice had fallen low, narrowed to a thin streak of sound, but still it gave him the horrors. “
‘Madman’? Who was that? Rond, wasn’t it? Marrus Rond. Mistake to leave you alive. Came here to fix that. No report from you to Guild wanted. Other things here. Place had weak god. Needed strong one. Me. Forget you. Take care of you next. Blaise Darnley. God. Blaise —
”

And then, Lockharn, very soft, very calm, very reasonable. “Now, you see, Captain. I can’t let that go on. Nobody could. I hope you fellows will look out for the farmers, see they get treated right …”

A look of dreadful fright creased Rond’s face. “Lockharn!” he cried. “What are you trying to do? Don’t — ”

“Watch out, Bosun. I’m coming to get you.”

Rond shouted, Blaise screamed, Lockharn spoke softly. The pettyboat came into view, high, far — away. Then all sound was cut off. The communicators seemed dead. Silently, up from the horizon, the
Persephone
hove into view. She went straight up, hovered. Jory, Rond, and every man, reached for his farseer. The great ship’s ramp was still out. It was packed with struggling figures which fought and tore and trampled one another as they tried, all at once, to gain the safety of the stairs and elevators. As they watched, more than one, trying to claw and scramble over the tightly wedged bodies of his fellows, lost balance and fell over the side, tumbling and pirouetting through the air. The ship tilted into an incline, gave a great swerve and turn — it could have only been deliberate: Blaise Darnley ridding himself of his unwilling crew — and the whole mass of men went sliding, clutching, clutching, semaphoring with arms and legs, down, down….