She watched Grauel and Barlog dismount, their fur on end, their weapons gripped tightly, their eyes in unceasing flickering motion. They felt the strangeness too. They felt the absence of the background of unconscious touch that existed everywhere at home.
Marika met Redoriad silth whom she did not remember five minutes later. They asked questions about the homeworld, for their cloister was off the main starpaths and they had little news. She and the Mistress answered, but she paid little heed to them or what she said. She was unable to get over the fact that she had done what she had done.
Marika did not sleep much during the time set aside for resting. Her curiosity was too strong once the impact of achievement began to lessen. She spent hours learning everything she could about the world.
That was not much. The silth had little commerce with the natives, who were very primitive and had nothing to offer in trade. The Redoriad maintained the cloister on Kim only as a means of enforcing their claim upon the planet and as an intermediate base from which further starworlds could be explored and exploited.
II
The homeworld flashed into being. Very good, Marika’s tutor sent. Almost perfect this time. You will do, Marika. You will do. You need to study your stars now, so that you can recognize them from any distance and angle. Then you will be ready to roam on your own.
Do darkships get lost?
Sometimes. Not so much anymore. The sisterhoods do not do much exploring these days.
Why not?
In the early days the voidfarers visited more than ten thousand stars and found little worth finding. There is little out there. Certainly little that can be profitably exploited. Nevertheless, in ten thousand stars there has been enough found that the few silth with the starfaring skill are kept quite busy. It has been a generation since anyone has had time for exploration.
Except for the Serke.
Perhaps. They found something, certainly.
Did they not, though.
Marika had her next step already planned. A thorough search of everything salvaged from the Serke before their disbandment. Somewhere in the records there might be a clue—though no one had yet found it.
The homeworld swelled, and with it a feeling of welcome, of returning to where she properly belonged, as the unconscious touch-world of all meth gradually enfolded her. She looked back at Grauel and Barlog, but could not see their faces. She sent a tendril of touch drifting over them, found them relaxed, pleased, almost comfortable. Out on the world called Kim they had been nervous and irritable all the time.
The darkship settled into the court of the new Redoriad cloister. There Marika’s tutor immediately took her leave, heading for Mistress’s quarters without a backward glance. As she rose to go on to her own cloister Marika wondered what new rumors would be spread about her now.
Hardly had she settled into the Reugge landing court, dismounted, formally thanked her bath, and begun soothing Grauel and Barlog, when Edzeka of Skiljansrode appeared. She hastened toward Marika with a portentous step.
“Something is wrong,” Grauel said. “Bad wrong. Else she would not have come out of her den.”
The joy had gone out of Barlog too. “I have an awful feeling, Marika. I do not think I want to hear this. Whatever it may be.”
“Then go. It is time you took a ceremonial meal with the voctors anyway. Isn’t it?”
Both huntresses gave her looks that suggested she was mad for saying they should leave her.
“Edzeka. What are you doing here? You look grim.”
“A nasty problem, mistress. Very nasty.”
Marika dismissed everyone else who had gathered around, who took it as a slight. She did not care. Never would she let herself fall into the manners and stylized forms of silth relationships. “Trouble at Skiljansrode?”
“Major, perhaps, mistress. The prisoner Kublin has escaped.”
Marika did not permit her feelings to show. “How did this happen? And how long ago?”
“Shortly after you departed for the stars. Or maybe just before. It is not absolutely certain yet. There is some evidence he chose that moment to move specifically because you would be out of touch. There were copies of intercepts at his workstation mentioning you going out. We have not pinned down his time of escape because it came during his off-hours. When not at his workstation he remained in his cell, even if offered an opportunity to move around.”
“I see. How did he manage it? Who was lax?”
“No one was lax, insofar as I could determine. He did it with the talent. There is no other explanation that will accommodate the facts, though not all of them are clear yet. Several voctors were injured or slain, and their injuries are all of the sort caused by one who wields the talent. It was the failure of those voctors to report that alerted us to the fact that something unusual was happening. We first thought someone had gotten in from outside, it making no sense for a prisoner to attempt escape. It was a while before someone noticed he was absent—by which time we did at least know that no one had come in from outside.”
“A search is being made, of course?”
“Every darkship we could lift. I myself came here aboard a saddleship so no bath would be wasted on the carrying of a message. I thought you would want this reported directly, without it passing through the paws of anyone else.”
“Thank you. That was thoughtful. How is the search progressing?”
“I do not know. I have been here awaiting you. Not well, though, I fear, else someone would have followed to tell me he has been recaptured.”
“He will be difficult to take if he has been honing wehrlen’s skills all this time.” Already Marika had begun consulting a mental map. These days Skiljansrode lay far up in frozen country. It would be a long walk for anyone, getting from that packfast to country where one could live off the land. Almost impossible even for a skilled nomad huntress accustomed to the ways of the frozen wastes. Due south would be both the shortest and easiest route.
Edzeka would know that. No point telling her what she knew, or upbraiding her for what could not have been her fault. “How much food did he take out with him? What sort of clothing and equipment? Has that been determined yet?”
“It had not at the time I left, mistress.”
“I know him. He would have prepared extensively. He would have made sure he knew all the risks and all the needs he would face. He would have prepared to the limit allowed by his situation. And he would not have moved unless he was convinced his chances were excellent, even with silth hunting him. He is a coward. But he doesn’t make desperate moves. Knowing the fickleness of the All, we would be utter fools to hope the winter would take him for us. What is your method of search?”
“I positioned three of my darkships twenty miles farther south than I believed he could possibly have traveled, even with the best of luck. The middle darkship I stationed right on top of the base course he is going to have to make. The other two I placed to either paw, at the limits of sight, within strong touch. All three darkships are at one thousand feet. That places a barrier forty miles wide directly across his path. He cannot avoid being seen or sensed without going at least twenty miles out of his way. In that country, in that ice and snow, that would mean at least three days of extra work. That should give winter’s paw a little extra edge.”
“I like that. Go on.”
“The other darkships are searching for him or physical evidence of his passage. The wind is blowing hard and there is fresh powder snow, but even so he cannot help leaving a trail.”
“Very good. Very good indeed. Logically, that should do for him, one way or another. Keep pressing so that he has to keep going out of his way. He will not dare light a fire. His food supply will dwindle. When he becomes weakened and tired he will have more difficulty hiding from the touch.”
Marika was not confident of that. She ought to claim a favor from Bagnel. His tradermales had tools more useful than silth talents. A few dirigibles prowling the wastes searching wit
h heat detectors might locate Kublin more quickly than any hundred silth.
“Edzeka. The hard question. What chance that he had help? From inside or out?”
“From inside, none whatsoever. Any helper would have fled with him, knowing we would truthsay every prisoner left behind. Which we did, without result. And there never have been any friends of the brethren or Serke among the sisters. Help from outside? Maybe. If someone knew he was there and had a means of getting messages to and from him.”
“A thought only.” Another thought: the means of communication might have existed right inside Kublin’s head. In all the years of isolation he would have had ample time to practice his far-touching. “Nothing came of the truthsaying?”
“Nothing had as of my departure. Final results will be available upon my return. Had they amounted to anything I am sure I would have heard.”
“Yes, Well. You may break radio silence if anything critical develops. If you do not have the necessary equipment, requisition it before you leave.”
“Thank you, mistress.”
“Have you enjoyed Ruhaack? You ought to get out more.”
“I have my work, mistress.”
“Yes, as we all do. Thank you for the report. This bears thought.” Marika extricated herself and hurried toward her apartment, lost in contemplation of what Kublin’s escape might portend.
If he did make it out, he could become especially troublesome if he did know what had happened to Gradwohl. She could not be certain he had been unconscious throughout their confrontation.
She had to consult Bagnel. Bagnel knew a little about Kublin. He could judge what Kublin’s escape could mean within the brethren.
Silth and huntresses who had survived the destruction of Maksche controlled that wing of the Ruhaack cloister where Marika dwelt. They were few, but intensely loyal to Marika, for they knew that she had tried to avenge their injury and knew she had not given up hope of further vengeance. They guarded her interests well. It was something of an amusing paradox. Marika had not been popular at all before the attack on Maksche.
A sister named Jancatch, who had been but a novice at the time of the Maksche disaster, awaited Marika at the entrance to her cloister within the cloister. Her face was taut. Her ears were down.
“Trouble?” Marika asked, thinking, what else?
“Perhaps, mistress. There was an urgent appeal for your presence from Most Senior Kiljar of the Redoriad some hours ago. An almost desperate call. We replied that you could not come because you had not returned from your travels. We were asked to inform you immediately when you did arrive, and to ask you to waste no time. No reason was stated, but there are rumors that she is dying.”
“Kiljar has been dying for most of the time that I have known her. With one breath she predicts that she will not live to see the sun rise again, and with the next vows to outlive all the carrion eaters waiting to grab the Redoriad first chair.”
“This time I believe that the crisis is genuine, mistress. The Redoriad have called in all their cloister councils and all their high ones who are inside the system. They have closed their gates to ordinary traffic.”
“Call them back. Speak to Kiljar herself if that is possible. Tell her or them that I have returned. That I am available immediately if necessary. Grauel, Barlog, assemble my saddleship. I will go over right now if that is what she desires.”
It was. Marika departed within minutes.
She was not welcomed at the Redoriad cloister. The halls were thick with important silth. One and all, they eyed her with hostility. She ignored them and the growls that came when she was granted immediate entry to Kiljar’s apartment. Even the most powerful of them had not been permitted that.
III
Kiljar appeared very near the edge. Her voice was little more than a whisper. She could not lift her head, nor more than slightly stretch her lips in greeting. But she did manage to issue strong orders to her attendants to leave them alone.
Marika felt a sadness rise within her, a rare sadness, a rare sorrow. Few meth meant much to her, but Kiljar had become one of those few. She took the old silth’s paw. “Mistress?”
Kiljar called upon her final reserves. “The All calls me, pup. This time there will be no deafening my ears to the summons.”
“Yes.” One did not hide such a truth from a Kiljar. “My heart is torn.” One should not hide that truth either.
“It has been good to me, Marika. It gave me more years that I expected or had the right to hope. I hope I have used them as well as I believe I have.”
“I think you have, mistress. I think you may have accomplished more than you suspect. I think you will be recalled as one of the great Redoriad.”
“I am not sure I wish to be recalled that way, pup. I think I want to be one of the remembered names in your legend. I think I want to be remembered as your teacher, as the one who brought you to see your responsibilities, your importance, as she who taught you to harness your inclination to excess…” Kiljar succumbed to a racking cough. Unable to help, Marika clung to her paw and fought back the sorrow bringing the water to her eyes.
Kiljar’s paw tightened upon hers. “I do not want to go into the darkness riding the fear that I have failed, Marika. You are not of my sisterhood. You are not of my blood. Yet I have made of you the favored pup of my pack. I have done much for you that you know, and much more that you do not. I have watched you grow, and have clung to life desperately in hopes that your growth would become complete and you would mature into a silth fit to stand beside Dra-Legit, Chahein, and Singer Harden. You are in the position, and these are the times. You have the power and the talent to shape the entire world. You are doing so, with your great metal suns. They are the one regret I know I will be carrying into the darkness. I would have lived to have seen them shedding their warmth.”
Marika’s throat had tightened till she could scarcely speak. She had to struggle to croak, “Mistress, you have been a true friend. I have found few of those. It is not a world for making friends.”
“The great never have many friends, pup. Perhaps I have been less a friend than you think, for I have had the temerity to try to shape your destiny. One friend does not try to force a role upon another.”
“You are a friend.”
“As you will. You know what I want, do you not?”
“I think I do.”
“You would, yes. You always know. But I will say it anyway. I do not want you to return to old hatreds once I can no longer be here to peer over your shoulder and be the whisper of your conscience. We have made a sound peace with the brethren. A peace that can last if it is given a chance. An accommodation with which the majority of silth and brethren both are content. To take up old grievances now would…”
“I will not, mistress. Though my stomach sours and my heart still fears their power, I will do nothing to alter the balance. I have reoriented my future toward the stars, as I had aimed during my novitiate. I have done what I can here. I will take my anger into the void in my search for the rogue Serke and their brethren masters. I will do nothing here unless others force me.”
“Yes. That is well. Go stalk the stars. Find the criminals. That is where the true danger lies—though it must be growing weaker. They have not been back, except to sneak messengers in, since you drove Starstalker into the void. But do not allow that hunt to rule you entirely, Marika. The All has given you talents most silth would commit the thousand crimes to possess. You have learned to evade the consequences of the Jiana complex. I hope. Its aura does not hang so strongly upon you now. You have resurrected the Reugge from the ashes and have given them the potential to become one of the great sisterhoods of the future.”
Kiljar coughed again, not so terribly. Marika waited in silence, knowing Kiljar was working hard to get said what she had to say.
“I suspect you now face an opportunity to do for the meth race what you have done for the Reugge. If you walk the stars in the proper frame of mind.”
?
??Mistress?”
“I see three frames. Three great portraits sketched upon a canvas of time, perhaps overlapping one another, all forming a complete new life. The first is that of a pup. I foresee you dark-faring for the wonder, for the thrill of venturing where none have gone before. That is a thrill I knew well when I was young and first faring the void.
“A second frame surrounds your quest for revenge upon those who did you, the Reugge, and all silth so much evil. It is in your character to become fixed within that frame, and to lose the wonder and the grand potential of what could come of a successful stalk. You must carry with you always the knowledge that a successful hunt could define the entire future of our race. Have you thought at all about what might come of open intercourse between our world and that of these aliens the Serke discovered?”
“Only a little, mistress,” Marika admitted. “My entire concentration has been devoted to the mirrors. But great evils or great benefits, surely.”
“Indeed. One or the other, but nothing trivial. They will be very different, pup. Very different, indeed, from what I have been able to learn. You must realize that they will not all be magnificent and terrible weapons and technologies and whatnot that not even the brethren have begun to suspect. They will be modes of thought and slants of eye and ways of hearing that have not occurred even to our greatest thinkers. They will be the product of a distinct evolution, with all that implies in the way of millions of years of shaping minds as well as forms. They will infect us with ten thousand new ideas, new hopes, new fears—as, I am sure, we will infect them. Imagine the impact of the silth ideal upon a species that has no concept of that sort.”
“I have seen the edges of such things, mistress, and I find them frightening.”
“Indeed. And how much more frightening to silth who are narrower of mind? Who have known but one way since first rising to walk upon their legs alone? How threatening to them? There is great potential in this meeting of races, and its shaping for good or evil will lie strongly in the paws of the successor to Bestrei, for that successor will have the strength to determine anything she wishes in the void. You recall the frontier maxim you quoted to me so often. As strength goes.”