But the vibrations had triggered his suspicions: the blur of sounds which had come to him as music. On any isolated structure trapped noises tended to travel, to become amplified, to linger in telltale whisperings. "But you haven"t betrayed anything. Others must know of Zabul. The Huag-Chi-Tsacowa, for example. And what of your other suppliers?"
She said, "You"re just trying to be kind. No matter what you say, I have broken a trust. The Elders-"
"To h.e.l.l with them!"
It would have been kinder to have slapped her in the face. She recoiled, eyes haunted, her hand shaking as she broke the connection. The screen went blank and a panel slid over it to turn it back into a part of a decorated wall that formed a small chamber fitted with chairs-part of an upper gallery.
Dumarest said, "You prate of finding Earth but what do you hope to find there? One thing must be freedom or all else is valueless. Why be afraid of the Elders? What are they but people who have clung to power for too long? Old, decaying, almost senile, close to being insane. Have spirit, Althea. Life is not to be lived in chains."
"No, Earl! You don"t understand!"
He shrugged and looked at the panel covering the screen, the wall, the chairs set in neat array. An auditorium designed for a forgotten purpose or, perhaps, those for whom it had been built were no longer interested.
Quietly he said, "How did it all begin? Did the younger sons of some rich families unite in a common aim? Or did the rulers of some commercial empire look for a way to extend their lives and power? It"s happened often in the course of history: those with wealth and authority chafing with the need to attend to every small detail. They hire or promote others to take over the worryof day-to-day business and turn to other, more enjoyable pursuits. But no matter what the reason, the result is always the same. Once power is yielded it is lost. Those promoted to handle the finances are reluctant to relinquish their positions. Normally it doesn"t matter; those who have yielded their fight are too busy having pleasure, and they die before managing to disturb the existing state of affairs. But if they should live too long-what then, Althea?"
"What?" She blinked as if recapturing her thoughts. "I don"t understand."
"I think you do. The Guardians-such a well-chosen word. The elect who look after those in the caskets and take care of all the tiresome details. What was it you told me? All the fruits of the universe come to Zabul-but who pays the price?"
"We help," she said. "Someone has to take care of things. The Guardians do good."
"Yes," he said dryly. "They do good. In fact they do very well."
She caught the tone, the meaning, the implied insult, and her hand rose, fingers curved, nails aimed to rip at his cheek. But her blow died as he gripped her wrist to hold it, staring into her eyes.
"Do you really want to find Earth?"
"How can you doubt it?"
"Do they? The Council?"
"Of course!" She winced and pulled at her wrist. Her hand had grown white beneath the pressure of his fingers. "Earl! My hand!"
"I come from Earth," he said as he released her. "By any form of logic here is a place where I surely should be welcome. To be questioned, tested, probed-at least to be listened to. Yet what happened? You were at the meeting and saw how they reacted."
"So?""They don"t want to find Earth."
"Impossible! They, all of us, live only for the Event!"
"So they tell you and so you believe." Dumarest hammered the point. "But think of how they reacted, what they said and did, their final decision. I offered to be tested and was refused-can you agree with the logic of that decision?"
"Logan had her reasons."
"And her fears. What happens to the Council after the Event?
Who will give the orders? Fill the seats of power? You have everything the universe can provide," he said bitterly. "Maybe some of the Council have developed expensive tastes."
"No!"
"Think about it. How can you be certain that I was not sent to examine you? To gauge your fitness to experience the Event. The one chance you will ever have, Althea. Thrown away by the greed of those who claim to rule you. Think about it, d.a.m.n you!
Think!"
Think and let the seeds of doubt he had planted sprout and grow into mistrust and suspicion. It was the only chance he had.
To destroy the rule of the Council in order to gain his own freedom-from more than their decree. Zabul was a ship and, if he had been traced, was now a prison.
"Earl?" Her tone was pleading as were her eyes. "Help me, darling."
To think? No, it was more than that and he was suddenly conscious of her vulnerability. Sheltered from childhood, protected, raised in a culture which admitted of no question as to its destiny, fed on dreams in which no unpleasantness could exist-how could she be other than a victim of those used to the normal rigors of life? The cheating and lying and violence and mistrust which all took in from their earliest days. a.s.similated it and learned to live with it And, like her, the Council."You must spread the word," he said. "To Volodya and Demich and those others who were more open-minded than Vole and the rest. Talk to them. Mention the chance they could be losing. Demand I be treated as what I am-the true representative of Earth. Unless you can demonstrate your desire for freedom you are not worthy of the Event."
Alone, he reactivated the screen, operating the controls she had touched and which he"d memorized. The stars were in their same, eternal splendor but his eyes shadowed as he looked at the s.p.a.ces between.
How long did he have before the enemy would strike?
Nubar Kusche woke from a dream in which all he touched turned to precious metal to stare into the face hovering above his own.
"Earl!" He tried to rise, then fell back as something p.r.i.c.ked his throat. Dabbing it, he saw a smear of blood on his fingers.
"Earl, for G.o.d"s sake!"
Dumarest lifted the knife to hold it poised in his right hand, his forearm resting on his knee, his right foot on the edge of Kusche"s bed.
He said mildly, "It"s time we had a talk."
"At the point of a knife?"
"Anyway you want-as long as you tell me the truth." The blade shifted, catching the light, reflecting it, forming transient glitters. "We"ll start with Caval. Why did you ride with the casket?"
"I told you."
"Tell me again." Dumarest listened, waiting until Kusche had finished. "You"re lying. I want the truth."
"You"ve had it." Kusche dabbed at his face, at his neck, looking at the sweat now mixed with the blood. "I just thoughtwe could make a deal."
"You"re an entrepreneur," said Dumarest. "Not a gambler.
You look for the chance to make an easy profit. The opportunity others may have missed or the opportunity you can make.
Nothing wrong in that unless you come up against someone with strong objections to be used. I"m that kind of person." The knife dipped, light gleaming on curved edges and point. "Who contacted you on Caval and told you to watch me?"
"No one. I swear it!"
"And later?" Dumarest"s voice hardened. "The truth, you fool!"
"Earl-"
"You were contacted and offered a commission, which you accepted. Ride with the casket-and what?"
"Nothing." Kusche lifted a defensive hand as he saw Dumarest"s expression. "For G.o.d"s sake, it"s the truth! I was just to ride with you."
"As you are? What about your baggage?"
"I had a valise and a kitbag. I lost them both." Kusche scowled. "There were some good things in that baggage: deeds to productive mines on nearby worlds, some samples, the formula of a new fuel. And I had a dozen good carvings, each worth a month"s high living in the right market."
"And your pay?" Dumarest saw the flicker of the other"s eyes.
"Give it to me."
"h.e.l.l, man, it"s all I"ve got!"
"You"ve a choice," said Dumarest. "I"m not playing games. You hand it over or I"ll cut it from your finger." He held out his left hand as Kusche pulled free the ring with the heavy stone. "That"s better. Now let"s take a look inside."
Rising, he went into the bathroom, set the ring on the tilesand smashed the pommel of his knife against the stone. It yielded at the second blow and from the crystalline shards he picked out a thread of wire-mesh, some nodules almost too small to see and a pile of paper-thin wafers of metal a fraction of an inch across.
"The b.a.s.t.a.r.d!" Kusche stared from over Dumarest"s shoulder.
"He told me it was real. A genuine stone."
"Who?"
"Brice Quimper. He"s an agent on Caval. Works for the Vosburgh Consortium." Kusche stared at the broken mechanism.
"What was it?"
"A locator." Dumarest threw the sc.r.a.ps into the drain. "I guessed you must have had one and searched the room. When I couldn"t find it I knew you had to be carrying it."
"Why?" Kusche answered his own question. "No baggage. But why?"
"Someone wanted to know just where you were at all times."
"Quimper?" Kusche frowned, then shook his head. If he was playing a part he was doing it well. "No-what reason could he have? I"m not important to him. I"m not important to anyone so-" He broke off, looking at Dumarest. "Not me, Earl-you!
They wanted me to ride with you so as to know where you could be found."
"They?"
"Whoever it was used Quimper. What interest could he have in you? There has to be someone else. I suspected it when I saw the activity of the guards." Kusche frowned again. "Used," he said bitterly. "The b.a.s.t.a.r.ds used me. Took my gear and d.a.m.ned near cost me my life." He rubbed at his throat. "If it hadn"t been for your fast talk we could both be dead by now."
Which meant that someone had made a mistake and the Cyclan did not make mistakes. What then? Dumarest walkedback into the other room, frowning, reviewing each moment since his waking. The casket-had a cyber predicted he was inside or had it been a lucky guess? The latter, he decided; for some reason no cyber had been present on Caval during his stay.
If one had he would have been taken. Instead their agent had used his initiative and taken an inexpensive precaution. Kusche had just been a convenient tool-or was that just what he wished to appear?
Dumarest watched as the man crossed to the table and poured himself wine. The hand holding the decanter seemed steady enough now that there was no ring to betray small quivers, but the wine gurgled in an uneven stream.
"Earl?" Kusche shrugged as Dumarest shook his head. "Just as you want." He drank and lowered the goblet to take a deep breath. Naked aside from shorts, he had a smooth plumpness which matched his face but, Dumarest knew, most of the bulk was muscle.
He said, "How did you get knocked out?"
"On the way here? With gas, I think. Yes, it must have been gas." Kusche swallowed more wine. "One second I was in my bunk and the next I was here with Volodya standing over me."
He added shrewdly, "Someone didn"t want me around."
Or had wanted him to stay with the casket. The Huag-Chi-Twacowa? It was possible; they would not want to run foul of the Cyclan, and by ga.s.sing and transshipping Kusche they would have protected their employers and so served both masters. Had the Cyclan known of the transshipment? Did Kusche know he was not on a world?
He gulped when Dumarest told him and poured himself more wine. An act to gain time in which to compose himself or to arrange his thoughts.
"You"re hotter than I guessed, Earl. I figured you for someone of value and hoped to make a deal but I never guessed at anything like this. Can you imagine what it takes to manipulate the Huag-Chi-Tsacowa? To fix it with them that I should be sentwith the casket?" He looked at his bare finger. "Now we know why it had to be that way. Just who the h.e.l.l is after you?"
"The Cyclan."
"What?"
"The Cyclan," repeated Dumarest and added, "Don"t you want to know why?"
A temptation and he watched as Kusche tried to fight it.
Knowledge was always an advantage; sometimes it could mean power and often meant wealth. At times, also, it could invite destruction.
"I"ve a secret," said Dumarest. "One stolen from the Cyclan.
They want it back. They want it so badly they will give a fortune to the man who will deliver me unharmed into their hands. They will spend anything to make sure I"m captured. Do you understand?"
Kusche swallowed, his eyes wary. "Why tell me all this?"
"You wanted to be my friend. My partner." Dumarest crossed to the table and cleared it, then, with a finger dipped in wine, marked fifteen of the deck of cards with as many different symbols. Laying them out he said, "Look at them. Remember them. They read from left to right and you start at the top. Look at them!"
Kusche looked at his face, at the hand, which had dipped to touch the hilt of the knife, and reluctantly obeyed.
"Each symbol represents a biological molecular unit," said Dumarest. "The secret lies in the sequence of their arrangement.
Now you know it. Now you are as important to the Cyclan as I am."
"No! How can I remember this?"
"Just keep looking."At the cards, the symbols he had drawn on them, the components of the affinity twin. The discovery the Cyclan hunted him to regain, for with it they would have the means to dominate the galaxy. But Kusche did not share the secret; the cards he studied had been laid out at random. The symbols they carried were known to the Cyclan but the all-important sequence remained with Dumarest alone.
Something Kusche couldn"t know. As he turned, his face beaded with sweat, Dumarest said, "Now we"re really partners, Nubar. If I"m caught and handed over to the Cyclan I"ll give them just five words. I"ll say, "Nubar Kusche knows the secret." Can you guess what will happen then?"
He would be hunted in turn, taken, put to the question. He had seen the symbols and could never honestly deny it, and the Cyclan would ruin his body and brain to learn the order in which they had been displayed. And, even if they had gained the secret, still he would be destroyed.
"You b.a.s.t.a.r.d! You"ve given me nothing and put my head in a noose! Why do this to me?" Kusche reached for wine, his hand trembling. "Why?"
Dumarest said flatly, "Because I need your help."