Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Novel 19 (4 page)

 
          
"Oh,
Dal, I am sorry—you should have told me—"

 
          
"Nothing
you could do about it, love. Anyhow, I told them I'd have disguised myself as a
woman with plastic what-do-you-callems for a chance to get at the Builder
ruins, and sometimes I almost think I meant it," he said, laughing.

 
          
Suddenly
she remembered. "Dal—the porter, the man in the red baldric—the one who
took our luggage; he made some kind of sign at you; a signal, it looked like a
password—"

 
          
"Oh;
that," Dal said, "Yes, I noticed—"

 
          
"What
did he say? I couldn't hear him?"

 
          
"He
said,
We
were
not born
in chains,"
Dal
told her, "Must be some kind of religious society. Like the Khorists, on
Betelgeuse Nine, who greet everybody with
Infinity is Peace,
remember?
Of course, that's more in your line than mine; I don't know much about subcultures
and subgroups and things like that." He smiled. "Or, really, give a
damn."

 
          
"I
had thought it might be some kind of male bonding society," she mused,
"but it sounds—I wonder if it is some kind of underground, a kind of
resistance movement against the government or something like that—"

 
          
Dal
looked uncomfortable. But he said, "Come off it, Cendri, outfits like that
would be secretive; they wouldn't walk up to a perfect stranger and make
revolutionary statements at him!"

 
          
Cendri
frowned; revolutionary statements? Well, she supposed
We
were
not born in chains might be regarded as a revolutionary statement
on a world where men literally wore tags or brands and were legally the
property of their women. She hadn't thought about it that way. But certainly
Dal was right; if it
was
intended as a revolutionary statement it would
hardly have been a greeting to a perfect stranger, let alone someone from
another planet!

 
          
"I'll
need to find out something about how the men live in this society—" she
began,
then
suddenly felt tired and shaky. This was
not time to argue. She went to the console and said, "Let's have some
drinks.
Hot or cold, Dal?"

 
          
"Cold,"
he said, "but you look as if you could use something hot, Cendri. Here,
let me get it for you." He installed her on one of the cushions and went
to the console.

 
          
The
control at the top dispensed, in a preformed fibrous cup, a hot liquid which
reminded Cendri, as she sipped it, of a hot fruit soup; but it was pleasantly
tart, and after sipping about half of it she felt sufficiently revived to feel
curious about Dai's cold drink and ask to taste it. It was dark brown and
tasted like iced cocoa, but after a small sip she felt so stimulated that she
began to wonder what it contained.
Caffeine?
An amphetamine-like alkaloid?
Social drugs varied greatly
from world to world.

 
          
Dal
sat beside her, looking at the painted screens. She looked at the small
squarish letters in the corner, saying, "You read the language better than
I do; what does it say?"

 
          
Dal
narrowed his eyes. "The name of the artist, I guess. Yes;
Painted
by the—students,
I guess—of
the school for
the
daughters
of fisherwomen.
Not much of a painting, but good for
schoolgirls, I suppose." He shifted his weight, restlessly. "I wonder
how long they're going to keep us
waiting?
It seems to
me this is no treatment for a VIP."

 
          
She
shrugged. "That depends on what their cultural attitudes are toward time
and punctuality. In some societies, we'd already have been kept waiting an
inexcusable length of time, and depending on our relative status as VIPs and
the status of the one appointed to meet us, our official greeter would abase
himself in the dust, or commit suicide with chagrin. On the other extreme, if
it's a society with a very loose attitude toward time and punctuality, nobody
might get around to remembering us for a couple of days. I suggest we make
ourselves comfortable, because we'll have to relax and accept
their
attitude,
whatever it is. That's the first rule for fieldwork in anthropology—find out
the society's taboos and attitudes toward time, and just accept them."

 
          
Dal
scowled angrily. "Damnation, Cendri, I made a casual comment, I didn't ask
for a lecture on anthropology!"

 
          
"I
wasn't lecturing—" Cendri began,
then
sighed.
"Sorry, darling. Habit, I guess."

 
          
"It's
all right," he said generously, "just remember you're not supposed to
be an anthropologist at all, and I don't think the Dame di Velo would know a
taboo if it walked up and spat on her!"

 
          
Cendri
looked at him in amazement. "Don't they give instructions like that in
your department? How can anyone possibly get along on any strange world without
first knowing their taboos and cultural imperatives?"

 
          
"We
manage to get along," he said, tight-lipped, and she sighed. "Dal,
let's not quarrel. Please."

 
          
"It
seems to me that you were doing the quarreling," he said, and Cendri bit
her lip and didn't answer. There was no point in making him angry. This trip was
going to test his forbearance to the uttermost. It was humiliating enough for
him to accept an outwardly subordinate position on this trip, and even now he
was wearing the collar-tag, locked on and marked with a number which proclaimed
him, on this planet, legally her property. She would have to bend over
backwards not to add further weight to his humiliation. She leaned again to
look at the paintings on the screens, stood up to examine those on the other
screen.

 
          
Abruptly,
it tilted toward her, fell; startled, thrown off balance, she clutched at Dal,
and they fell together to the floor, the screen collapsing on top of them.
There was a rumble like distant thunder; all over the building she heard cries,
the sound of collapsing screens and interior walls. Shocked, clinging to Dal,
she thought;
it must be an earthquake!
The drink console rocked back and
forth, but did not fall; it must be
on rollers!

 
          
The
tremor went on for several seconds; subsided. A little greyish powder sifted
from the stone wall of the building, behind the screen, but the exterior walls
had withstood the seismic shock; and now Cendri understood the purpose of the
screens. Rigid interior walls might collapse, and have to be tediously rebuilt;
Dal lifted the collapsed screen off them with one hand.

 
          
A
young woman with a red baldric tied around one shoulder appeared in the gap
left by the collapsed screen. She said quickly, without salutation, "Come
with me at once; there may be aftershocks, and the building must be
emptied!"

 
          
Dal
helped Cendri to her feet; Cendri met the amazed stare of the woman with the
baldric and moved away from him. They followed her quickly through a corridor
cluttered with the fallen screens, some of them splintered and torn; out of the
building, and on to a long expanse of vegetation. She said, "You are the
Scholar from University?" At Cendri's nod she said quickly, "Forgive
my ignorance of diplomatic courtesies, but you must stay here. I must go back
and make certain that all the pregnant women and visitors are out of the
building. If you will wait here, I will send someone to you as soon as
possible." She hurried away, looking backward with a troubled glance.

 
          
Dal
shook his head in astonishment. "Some welcome to this world! Do you
suppose they have this kind of thing very often? You noticed the heavy
equipment set on rollers?"

 
          
"I
noticed," she said. "They seem to have everything ready for
earthquakes! I seem to remember—" she frowned; before coming here she had
read—quickly, scanning for anything of importance— everything she could find
about the settlement of Isis/Cinderella.
The planet then
known as Cinderella had been considered, for some reason, undesirable for
colonization or homesteading.
If it was notably seismic, that was
completely understandable. Yet it had been the only planet available for the
Matriarchate. They seemed to have developed sophisticated methods for dealing
with earthquakes—light interior construction, heavy equipment on rollers, and
she would be willing to make a guess that they also had taboos about untended
fires! Even now she could see flames shooting up from one corner of the
building, and people were running and shouting and dragging hoses, mounted on
small motorized platforms. The firefighting techniques looked efficient and quick.

 
          
Dal
whistled in surprise. "Cendri—they are women, fighting the fire!"

 
          
"Well,
Dal, it is a Matriarchy—"

 
          
"But
surely, for heavy manual work, dangerous work—" he protested. "Surely
men are physically stronger, wouldn't work like that fall naturally to
them?"

 
          
"I'd
have thought so," she said, "but we don't know, yet. I wouldn't
comment on it, if I were you."

 
          
He
said shortly, "I don't suppose anyone would listen if I did."

 
          
The
women, in thick short protective coats of woven fiber, cut away the torn screens
and dragged them to where they could burn out, unattended. There was black
smoke which looked as if some electrical fixtures had caught fire, but it was
quickly extinguished. Abruptly it was all over; women with smoke-smudged faces
coiled up the hoses and trundled away the platforms, and the people who had
been sent out of the buildings began to drift back toward them. A few women
were still spraying down the open hangar and the shuttleships, to prevent any
spray spark from damaging ships or fuel.

 
          
Cendri
wondered if their luggage was safe; they had brought a great deal of reference
material, books, tapes, recording equipment. Ought she to go and see? But when
Dal expressed anxiety she hesitated.

 
          
"They
told us to wait
here,
they'll send someone for us.
Look, I think that must be someone coming now, that woman is pointing at
us—see?"

 
          
The
woman she indicated was one of those who had come last from the burning
building; because of their actions and obvious concern Cendri had tentatively
identified them as having something to do with the machinery and
instrumentation there. She was pointing Cendri and Dal out to a woman in a
pale-blue flowered pajama suit, very loose, with a broad-brimmed sun hat and
her dark hair in a long braid down her back. The woman spoke to her informant
and then began to hurry toward Cendri and Dal. As she came, Cendri could see
that the woman was very young—younger than Cendri herself—and that she was
heavily pregnant.

 
          
She
stopped a little way from Cendri, and waited, saying hesitantly, "Scholar
Dame Malocq?"

 
          
Cendri
identified herself noncommittally. Until she knew more about the customs here,
she knew it would be a breach of etiquette to do almost anything. It might also
be a breach of manners to do nothing, but sins of omission were usually less
serious, in most cultures, than sins of commission. Dal, she observed—not
having her extensive training in cross-cultural protocol—had already bowed; but
the woman's eyes did not rest on him even for a moment.

 
         
'

 
         
She
said, "I am Miranda, third daughter of the Pro-Matriarch Vaniya; my
venerable Mother has asked me to come and escort you in person to her country
home. As you can see—" she made nervous gesture toward the people jostling
around the building, from which a few gouts of smoke were still drifting,
"we have had some troubles, and since the quake was felt in the City, too,
the Pro-Matriarch was not free to come and greet you herself. She sent me to
welcome you, and beg that you will forgive the apparent discourtesy."

 
          
Cendri
made a formal bow, hands clasped before her face in the manner of the Unity.
"The Pro-Matriarch does me too much honor, Lady Miranda."