Strangers (21 page)

Another long silence, then Farber seemed to untense a little for the first time, slumping back against the cushions. He closed his eyes again.

“All right,” he said. “I’ll take it.”

Ferri drained his glass in one fervent gulp.

Farber made one more stop on the way home, visiting a rat-faced steward who worked in the Co-op VIP Mess.

From him, Farber bought a gun.

It was an outdated, secondhand projectile weapon, one of thousands on the Co-op black market, and nowhere near as classy as the kilowatt lasers used by the honor guards at the Enclave.

But it worked.

20

Thinking gray, coagulated thoughts, Farber took the cablecar up to Old City. He watched the pastel sea of roofs spread out and fall away below as the car rose, and he told himself,
I will not let it happen
. He repeated it aloud, but the Cian riding with him were too polite to stare. Perhaps they edged infinitesimally away, perhaps not. Farber was oblivious of them in either case. “She isn’t responsible,” he announced to the air. “She doesn’t know any better.” Almost to the top now, and he felt his stomach and thighs tightening, as if he was unconsciously preparing himself for combat. The car ratcheted as it swung through the coupling and up to the station platform, bright reticulations shook across the windows, the walls vibrated. He rested his forehead against the cool, buzzing metal, and was instantly overwhelmed by the smell of her body, the taste of her secret flesh, the texture of her skin, her voice, her calm eyes, the soft pressure of her hands and mouth and tongue—more a cellular remembrance than an ordinary memory. She was imprinted on him; he was surprised it hadn’t left visible marks on his skin.
I will not let it happen
, he thought. “I won’t let them take her,” he remarked conversationally to the alien standing next to him. The Cian smiled noncommittally, and edged away. The car stopped.

He was making his way up Kite Hill when he first heard the music.

He began to run ponderously, weighted down by the heavy backpack, stiff from a lack of sleep and hungover as hell, but grimly covering the ground anyway. He skidded around a corner onto the Row, and there they were: a large Procession marking time in front of his house, drums and
tikans
skirling, Talismans held high. In front of the Procession proper stood the
twizan
and the
soúbrae
. Off to one side was Genawen, beaming at everyone, looking almost fatuously happy. Up and down the Row, people had poked their heads out of windows to watch, and the whole scene had the relaxed, festive formality of an old-fashioned Fourth of July parade.

Farber felt himself go very cold.

Something in the back of his throat tasted like molten iron.

He came forward at a stiff-legged walk, not trusting himself to run, afraid of what might happen if his anger should shake itself completely free. He speeded up on his last few steps, and hit the dense-packed crowd like a shark slamming into a bloodied carcass. He bulled through the Procession, shoving, hitting, scooping the little men up and tossing them aside, much rougher than he had been with the crowd the previous night, not really caring if anyone got hurt. A Talisman went over, its weight pulling its bearer down with it. Another—a huge swollen-headed grotesquerie—swooped and wobbled like a comic drunk. A nose-flute was cut off with a squawk as Farber straight-armed a musician from behind. A
tikan
clattered under Farber’s feet, and he stomped on it with malicious pleasure. There was a shout, another, and a general discord of music that swept from the rear of the Procession to the front as Farber’s passage made itself felt. At last, Farber broke into the open. The musicians stopped playing entirely.

The
twizan
stepped into Farber’s path. “Citizen—” he began to say, placatingly, but Farber shoved him roughly aside. Farber made it to the front door of his house, and whirled.

Panting, he stared at the crowd.

The crowd stared back in stunned silence. The
twizan
on his knees, getting up from where he had fallen. The
soúbrae
—the one from Liraun’s Naming—looking levelly at him with eyes of ice. Genawen, a big grin frozen idiotically on his face. The rest of the marchers in various stages of disarray. There was no sound.

Farber was trembling, falling apart, trying to keep some semblance of control. Fear and fury impelled him to speech, but it was a while before he could get his voice working right.

“Out!” he shouted hoarsely.

Genawen’s fat face collapsed in dismay. “Joseph—” he said, in a quavering, incredulous voice.

The
twizan
was on his feet and edging backward.

“
Get out!
” Farber screamed. “
Goddamn you all to hell!
” He had more to say, but what control he’d kept was slipping, and his voice, as he continued to shout, passed into strangled incoherency. He came forward in a stumbling rush, swinging his arms.

The Old Woman made as if to stand her ground, but the appalled
twizan
seized her arm at the last moment and hauled her back. Reluctantly, she allowed the
twizan
to hustle her away, looking back at Farber all the time, her face like stone, her eyes brilliant with hate. Genawen hesitated, but Farber shoved him and shouted nearly in his face, and he gave ground too, staggering and almost falling, looking hurt and totally bewildered. Farber followed them for only a few steps, and then stopped, breathing heavily. He shouted again, in derision.

Dazed and horrified, they let Farber run them off.

With the retreat of its three principals, the Procession backed off
in toto
. Within seconds, it had turned into a slow-motion rout, everyone flowing away down the Row, confused and demoralized, turning their heads to look back, their faces showing every possible degree of dismay. Farber waited until he was sure they were leaving, then went into the house.

Liraun was sitting near the hearth, looking pale and tired. Standing next to her, with his back toward Farber, was Jacawen’s son, Mordana. He was leaning over her, one hand on the arm of her chair, talking urgently to her in a low, persuasive voice. Her face was drawn. She kept shaking her head in an exhausted, baffled way, but Mordana kept on at her, insistently.

Two iron thumbs behind Farber’s eyeballs, pushing out.

Farber crossed the room in three enormous strides. He clamped a big horny hand around Mordana’s shoulder and began to drag him away.

Mordana hissed, and spun around with terrifying speed, breaking Farber’s grip. A knife grew out of his fist, like magic.

Farber stumbled backward in dismay, suddenly feeling clumsy and slow and vulnerable, an ungainly clay-footed golem matched against a creature of tigerish grace and ferocity. He made an awkward warding gesture with his open hand. It was sluggish and ineffective, even to his own eyes, and he became suffused with a dull, incongruous embarrassment that made him even slower. He never thought of the pistol inside his pack. Instead, he took another step backward. It seemed as if he was swimming through syrup.

Dropping into a crouch, Mordana shuffled forward, his arms low and extended, the point of the knife making slow, minuscule circles in the air. His face was intent and very serious. His eyes were opaque with rage. He began to edge sideways like a crab, coming a step nearer with every few steps to the side, turning Farber in a circle to get the sun in his eyes. Numbly, Farber let himself be turned—he felt ponderous and stupid, and he kept his useless hand out, palm open, as if he would simply push the knife aside, gently, as he would something proffered but not desired. He blinked as the sunlight hit his face. Instantly, Mordana started to come in at him, fast and low, going for the belly.

“Mordana!” Liraun cried.

She had found her voice, and she was on her feet. The blood had drained from her face. She was swaying.

Mordana pulled back in the middle of his stride, as though he had been yanked by a rope. He glanced at Liraun, then stared intently at her. Then, reluctantly, grimacing fastidiously, he straightened up. He shook himself, like a cat, and was once again poised and remote. The knife disappeared—Farber could not tell where it had gone. Mordana nodded politely to Liraun, turned, spat deliberately at Farber’s feet, and then went quickly out of the house.

Farber and Liraun were left alone to stare at each other through an enormous silence.

“Sit down before you fall down,” Farber said at last, with less authority than he would have liked. He was shaking, and bathed in cold sweat, and something of that had crept into his voice.

Liraun ignored him. She had braced herself against the back of her chair, and she was looking through him, not at him. Something complex was happening in her face, it was settling into new, hard lines, it was taking on determination and purpose even as he watched. At last, she focused her eyes on him. Her gaze was calm and adamant, and she came very close to frightening him, in her moment. She let go of the chair and stood unassisted, staring levelly at him. “Listen to me, Joseph,” she said quietly. “I’m going to go out to them.”

“Like hell you are,” Farber grated.

“You can’t try to keep me here, Joseph. It’s wrong.”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said blindly. “Just sit down. Sit down and keep quiet, for God’s sake.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I have to
think
. Oh Christ.” Wearily: “
Will
you sit down?”

“You don’t understand—”

“No, damn straight, I don’t understand! Too fucking right!” He was amazed at the harshness of his own voice. The flare of temper took him two quick steps forward, then it guttered abruptly. He stopped, slump-shouldered. Liraun was watching him intently, looking hard as nails in spite of the soft swell to her stomach. In her last few days, pregnancy seemed to have invested her with an odd, ponderous invulnerability, a finality, an irresistible momentum. He wondered, uneasily, if he could stop her. “Oh hell,” he said. “Look, we’re going to work this out. But you’re not going anywhere, understand?”

“That is a very wrong thing,” she said flatly. “That will destroy all Harmony.”

“But to let them throw you away like garbage, that’s okay,” he said sullenly. “To pack you in a box, like garbage, and scratch out a hole in the hills and kick dirt in over you, by you that’s fine. That’s all right.”

“What is left of me after I am dead is no better than garbage,” she said, with equanimity. “The flesh is boiled away; it has its uses: genetic material for the Tailors, fertilizer, other things. The bones are buried, with respect, yes, but with no need for ceremony—all the sacred parts are already gone, can’t you see?”

Farber turned away from her. His face had gone slack. His hands were shaking. “You’re making me sick,” he muttered. “Christ. I can’t— You
are
crazy. Why? How can you—”

“Joseph!” she cried, pain openly in her voice for the first time. “I can’t talk about it any more. It’s the most private thing in my life, between me and the People of Power, and it’s so wrong to talk of it, even to you. Can’t you see that?”

“Taboo,” he said, scornfully.

Not understanding that: “Joseph, I must go now.” Her voice had become strained and unsteady. “Please—let me go with your blessing and your love. That would mean very much to me.”

“Sit down,” Farber said.

Grimly, Liraun set her lips. She began walking toward the door.

“You’re my wife!” Farber cried.

“And you are my husband,” Liraun said in her new hard voice as she made her way slowly, painfully and patiently across the room. “But my children belong to my people. Nothing must jeopardize them. Not even you.”

Farber stepped into her path, and she kept coming. He felt tired and dispirited and bitter, and for a moment—contemplating the emotional effort it would take to keep her here—he was very tempted to give up and step aside, to let her go, to let her do what she wanted to do. In a way, it would be a relief. In a way, he would be satisfied just to get this whole thing over with, at any cost. He would almost be glad. But in the wake of that realization, triggered by it, came a surge of sharp-edged, unbearable guilt. Unable to take that, he found an ember of rage inside him and fanned it to life. All this in a second: so that by the time Liraun reached him his muscles were taut and his face was flushed, and he reached out and seized her by the arms. Something wild blazed up in her eyes. Wordlessly, they wrestled back and forth, pitting one leverage against another, their feet hardly moving. She was amazingly strong, but not strong enough to break free of him. Apparently she realized this—her face became pinched, her eyes desperate. Her lips had ridden back from her canines, and Farber wondered—with a stab of real fear—if she would try to bite him. Instead she began throwing herself back and forth in his grip, panting, thrashing as wildly as a bird in a net, thrashing with such frantic violence that Farber became afraid that she would seriously injure herself. Dispassionately, almost mechanically, he struck her across the face.

At once, she went limp in his arms. He stood, supporting her weight, too burnt out to feel much remorse. He had even enjoyed it a little. Liraun was getting heavy. He tried pushing her erect, and found that she would stay where he put her, her muscles reshaping like putty under steady pressure. She was not conscious. Her eyes were open, but they were bland—fused over and opaque. There was a tarry, glistening streak of blood leaking from the corner of her mouth.

Like a doll, she let him walk her to a chair.

She would not speak. He talked to her gently for a long time, coaxing, explaining, pleading, admonishing, finally blowing up and shouting at her. Nothing worked—she would not answer. She gave no indication that she had heard him, or that she was even aware of her surroundings. She just sat there, where he had put her, not moving, her hands in her lap in front of her.

Finally, he gave it up. He bustled about the room for a while, then he came back and sat down next to Liraun. He tried to think if there was anything he’d forgotten to do. He’d set up the diagnosticator, and used it to put a call through to Ferri to make sure the remote linkage was working. He’d hired a wet nurse on the way up this morning, a crusty, middle-aged man who kept himself in permanent lactation by the use of artificial hormone injections. He had the pistol, thrust through his belt. He drew it, slid out the clip to check it. One thing in his advantage: the city didn’t seem to have a police force, not the kind they had on Terra, anyway. The Cian seemed to rely mostly on tradition and taboo, and peer-group pressure: the terrible threat of ostracism. But the system was not designed to cope with a total maverick like himself. There was a core of doctor-monitors who dealt with the insane, and with the occasional berserker or rowdy drunk, but, unlike Terrans, the Cian were not hypocritical enough to judge him insane simply because he insisted on doing something they didn’t like. Not yet, anyway. The Twilight People acted as arbitrators in ethical disputes, and sometimes as referees for the more formal duels, but they had no punitive capability. What did that leave? A lynch mob? Possible—but it should take them a fair while to work themselves up to that. Religion? Moral persuasion? Would he have to shoot any of them?