The Margarets (29 page)

Rei patted my shoulder and pointed to a tree we were passing. “That’s what’s making you shiver. We call that Fros-bane. Take a good look at it. You don’t want to touch it, ever.”

The bole was a pale green, smooth as my own skin, with tiny beads of amber upon it, evenly spread as dew.

“See those drops? That’s the bad stuff. Like an acid. Eats your skin, gets into your blood, you end curled up in a circle, screaming at the pain. The Gibbekot have planted them all through the woods, along here. They’re immune to the stuff, but the Frossians aren’t.”

“The trees might work better if they didn’t smell so bad,” I opined. “I’d avoid them just because of the smell.”

Rei grinned. “Frossians have no sense of smell. Didn’t anyone ever tell you that?”

I glared at him. “They’ve been saying I stink for the better part of fifteen years!”

“They say it because we say it. If the hay is moldy, we say it stinks. The Frossians think it means rotten, evil, malign. They can see in the infrared, but they have no sense of smell. Ghoss do, however. Umoxen do, and the Gibbekot don’t want to hurt Ghoss or umoxen.”

I thought about this. “Is this tree natural? Or was it genetically created by the Gibbekot?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because poisons and thorns and other defenses usually evolve against a particular life-form. The Frossians aren’t native here, so it wasn’t against them. What kind of thing threatened these trees to make them develop this defense?”

Rei said over his shoulder, “The Gibbekot got them from the world where the Frossian queens live. It’s the only world that’s truly Frossian, the great hatchery from which they all come, and there are deep valleys there full of trees that had already evolved defenses. The Gibbekot just sent for them.”

“The Gibbekot are spacefaring?” I asked in amazement. “You never said they were spacefaring.”

“I still haven’t. I said sent, not went. Now hush. You’re making too much noise. That aircar may be carrying listening devices, and we need to keep our eyes and ears open.”

To me, whatever path we followed was indistinguishable from any
other way among the trees. The forest floor was covered with a thick blanket of leaves, needles, mosses, all held together by the wiry stems of ubiquitous creeper that grew only a finger’s width high but unendingly wide. When I turned to look back, the way we had come, I couldn’t see a footprint anywhere. The creeper simply flattened beneath our feet and sprang back once we had passed.

I whispered, “How are you finding your way?”

“Ghossways,” came the reply. “Now hush.”

I hushed. We heard the aircar behind us, in the direction of the lake, I thought. It came a little closer, then turned back the way it had come. We walked for an hour or more, then began to climb as the floor of the valley climbed. By this time, evening had come, all aircar sounds had ceased, and the darkness beneath the trees had increased enough that I was eager to emerge from the gloom. Within a few hundred yards, we came from the shadow into the red light of sunset, the sky scattered with clouds ranging from gold to crimson to violet-gray. Before emerging, we scanned the sky carefully to be sure it was empty. When we were sure, we climbed a slanting ledge to an outcropping of stone that jutted from the hilltop, a narrow slot in it leading to another small, sheltered cave.

“How many of these places are there?” I asked.

“Enough to hide us, whatever direction we go. Tonight we stop here,” said Rei, gesturing to include sandy floor, smooth walls, a store of firewood stacked high against one wall, a water jar, sacks of food. “They know we’re here. When they’re ready, they’ll send for us.”

“And until then?” I asked.

“We can build a fire, heat some food, talk about the weather, read a book—I brought one for you…”

“A book,” I breathed. “I haven’t read anything for…”

“I know,” he said. “I brought you a book written by a Gibbekot. We’ll read it together, and that will give you a taste of their language.”

I warmed myself at the fire, ate the food Rei provided, drank the tea he gave me, something new, something with an oddly attractive taste. I started to look at the book, a simple collection of words, one to a page, but was too sleepy to go on. Yawning, I curled up beside the fire.

I was not asleep. It felt like a dream while asleep, but I knew it
wasn’t a dream. Rei watched me. When I was totally relaxed, he reached out to shake me. I tried to speak, couldn’t speak, tried to move, couldn’t move. I should have been afraid, but I wasn’t. It was peaceful where I was, a firelit bubble of complete tranquillity.

“She’s sleeping,” he called.

The two beings who materialized at the entrance to the cave spoke to Rei with soft voices as they carefully unwrapped something they had brought with them. Rei turned me onto my stomach and applied whatever it was gently to the base of my skull. I felt something there, a kind of creepiness, as of something settling into place.

“How long will she be like that?” asked Rei.

One of the beings said, “Until it’s completely absorbed. It grows up under the skull in back, very thin, very flat. Then it has to connect to the rest of the brain, and that takes a while.”

The other said, “It takes a good while, actually. It could take as long as a season…”

“She’ll go on sleeping all that time?” asked Rei, with a furtive look at the stack of supplies.

“Yes. She’s profoundly asleep, though a dream state sometimes occurs, and she may be aware this is happening. Don’t worry about the process, it’s always successful. All her body functions are slowed down, as though she were hibernating. She won’t need to eat or drink. Just send an emanation if you need more supplies, and someone will bring them. Keep her warm.”

“We’ll be safe here?”

“Completely,” said the larger one, with a lick at his fangs and a twist of his furry ears. “You may depend upon it. When she wakes, there will be a period of confusion. Just ease her through it, and don’t forget to read her the book.”

“But she already knows her language.”

“She doesn’t know ours,” said a visitor, departing.

Rei took the book from my hand and put it safely with our packs before covering me with a blanket. I remember thinking how thoughtful they had been, but then, they had known we would be coming.

On Shore, which is what the water people call their world, little towns have been built all up and down the sea’s edge, many of them on stilts above the water, and waterside property is already filled. Some of the people have moved back into the forest and built mud houses there. It is warmer in the forest, where the trees break the sea winds at night, but the people come back to the shore in the daytimes, to fish and gather seaweed, while the children race up and down the sandy beaches, in and out of the warm, rolling sea. Most of the females are pregnant most of the time, and there are many, many babies.

Through sensors planted here and there, I, Wilvia, watch, I, Wilvia, listen. Half insane in my solitude, I have memorized their faces and names, have learned their simple language. I understand when one tribe of the people talks of starting a new village. The old village is getting crowded, they say, and they think it would be good to go up the river a long way. The good food of the shore can be found up the river, too, where there is room to spread out. Also, the biggest trees grow along the river, the best ones for boats! They can build boats and trade the boats for things to eat.

“Maybe we should leave big trees,” says one of the males. “Takes a long time to grow a big tree.”

“There’s more,” says another one of the males. “There’s plenty of big trees. They’ll never run out.”

“I guess you’re right,” replies the first one. “We do have to make room for more of us all the time.”

“Oh, yes,” the other replies. “We always have to make room for more.”

“Fools,” I say, thrusting my forehead against the screen I am watching, reaching out to turn off the sound. “Oh, fools, fools.”

Perhaps I should go outside. Perhaps I should show myself to them. Become their queen, perhaps, if they don’t kill me first. Rule them as Joziré and I ruled the Ghoss…

We had a Trajian juggler at the court. The Trajian are long-lived but few, inveterate wanderers, often abused and abased, seemingly unable to settle in any one place. Their females command a very high bride-price, as there is only one of them for every two or three males. My juggler, Yarov, was a solemn little long-armed fellow with no assistant, no mate, for he had been unable to raise the bride-price necessary. He had stayed with us for a surprisingly long time. When I knew we might have to flee, I gave him a box of gold and gems, things he could use to travel, to keep himself, to buy a wife, for I knew how lonely he was. He stood before me, his little mouth open, as though he could not understand kindness. I told him it was not half what I owed him for the pleasure he had given us.

I wonder about him often. He did a wonderful trick, tossing a little carved king into the air, which separated and came down, arms, legs, torso, head, crown, seven separate pieces that were miraculously reassembled and tossed skyward again. I took it as an omen. Though our reign might be broken, we would reassemble and reign again…

So, should I reign over these creatures?

No, and no, and no. Those who brought me here said both my life and the future of mankind depends upon Queen Wilvia staying hidden! Hidden on this virtually unvisited planet called Hell, buried in this ancient Gentheran ship, only its sensors connecting me to reality, only its maintenance system keeping me alive. Only this stale tragedy to occupy me: these fools…

So, I am in hell, Wilvia is in hell. But, oh, my children, where are they? Beloved! Where is he? Where are those I love while I cower here, of no use, no use to them at all.

Joziré and I ruled the Ghoss, and we did it well. I was pregnant,
expecting our first child, when the Thongal came. Joziré was taken off in one direction, I was taken in another. For a while, I was hidden in a Walled-Off on Tercis. It was a strange place, but better than this. The hunters followed me there, so we went to Chottem, to live among the Gentherans. There, the Gardener visited us from time to time to reassure me that Joziré was well. That was far, far better than this. Then hunters came to Chottem, so we returned to Tercis, only for a little time, and my protectors brought me here. My guides said no one would find me, and they would be my companions.

But they had to leave. Just for a time, they said. They planned to return. Perhaps they were caught, killed…

Patience. Patience. I say the word over and over, accompanying each thud of my forehead against the steel. And how long will patience alone keep me relatively sane? Is it even important to be relatively sane? I wait, and weep, as I watch the little creatures outside begin the destruction of their world yet again.

Under the dome of Dominion Central Authority on Mars, Sophia and I sat among a scattering of people, Human and Gentheran, most of them chatting quietly among themselves. Later in the day most of them would attend a meeting of Dominion Central Authority. This earlier gathering was by invitation, in order to hear a report on the effect of the general sterilant, and on Earth’s rehabilitation since its application. Sophia had come to Dominion headquarters to conduct certain business before she descended upon Bray, and the Gardener had thought I would be an inconspicuous companion.

“Sophia,” I murmured. “Your business here on Mars is completed, and strictly speaking, we are not invited to this gathering.”

“Let us stay until they throw us out,” she said, her eyes bright. This was her first trip away from the Gardener, away from Chottem, and she was excited by everything. “Tell them that as the heiress of Bray, I am interested in the work of the Dominion.”

“Actually, only a few members of Dominion were invited to be here,” I whispered. “However, if we are very quiet, and if you keep your cloak around you and your hood shadowing your face, they may not notice us.”

She giggled. If she removed the cloak, both of us knew very well they would notice her, whether they noticed me or not.

The Gentheran laboratory representative was as Gentherans always are, fully suited and helmed. He spoke Earthian, as any Gentheran did who had anything to do with humans. “Out of respect,” the Gardener had said, though she had not explained respect for what.

He introduced himself as Prrr (rolled
r
’s) Tgrr (a great many more rolled
r
’s.) “Our cooperating contractors and researchers have asked us for an update on the Earth rehabilitation situation. You will recall that during the first Earth-year after the sterilant was applied, the population, exclusive of those outshipped, dropped by slightly over one-point-one-nine percent. It was predicted that between point-nine and one-point-two percent of the population would die naturally in that time, so we are well within the estimates.

“The task of consolidating the population into smaller areas met resistance only during the fifth and sixth year, when the first consolidations took place. There is still some complaint, but it is generally pro forma griping that precedes orderly acquiescence. We make no attempt to remove outlying population centers until the nearest city has lost at least five percent of its population. Only then are outlying populations moved into the vacated housing and the empty nonurban communities razed. Though the process is slow, it is happening everywhere, which makes it an enormous undertaking. We have enlisted all human construction industries to help us in rehabilitation, and all children over the age of ten are required to assist in restoration of grasslands and forests.

“We have replanted five percent of the Brazilian desert where at one time jungles grew in leaf mold containing thousands of microorganisms atop hard, infertile soil. When the trees were burned, so was the leaf mold, along with the microorganisms. The stony, sterile ground was barren. On these barrens we have planted hardy ‘starvation’-type coverage: many thorns, few leaves. When these have had a few decades to accumulate organic detritus, we will plant slightly less hardy things at their roots. After another few decades, we can plant the next generation, and so on. It will take over two hundred years for each acre to achieve fifteen percent of the organic mass it once
held. It will take a millennium or more for each acre to achieve anything approaching the fertile growth that was its glory as one of Earth’s chief oxygenators.”

The listeners murmured at this.

“I have said nothing about fauna. Earth fauna was almost totally destroyed long before the sterilant was applied. We have genetic materials from the creatures that were typed before the forests were destroyed, but the typed ones were mostly larger animals that made up only a tiny percentage of the total life-forms. Many bacteria, for example, were never collected, never known to exist. The people of Earth did not understand that humans were part of a worldwide organism, that something as tiny as a cluster of bacteria could mean the difference between life and death for every living thing, the difference between a functioning, flourishing planet and a desolation. We Gentherans believe, as did the Pthas, that this is also true on a galactic scale: Very small things make very large differences, and we must be careful about destruction, even of things that seem useless or evil. We are experimenting with biotic clusters that are functionally parallel to the lost ones, but we cannot expect to achieve a total replication unless we find a pocket, somewhere, of the original forest. Such miraculous finds have happened during reconstructions of other planets, in the mouths of caves or in narrow canyons. We might be lucky enough to find one.

“It is too early to discuss any rehabilitation of the oceans. Perhaps in three or four hundred years, that process may be begun. Are there any questions?”

We listened to the ensuing discussion, some of which reminded me quite a bit of conversations I’d heard on Phobos, as a child. It was concerned with rehabilitation contracts and with the imposition of sustainable economic models. Earth had always operated on a continuous-growth model that requires a poverty class. Sustainable models require productive work by all members and are quite different.

When all the talk was over, the Gentheran thanked them for their attention and the audience, chattering, rose and dispersed. In the doorway, Sophia and I lingered.

Sophia said, “Why didn’t the Gardener tell us about planetary
economics? I shall have to read up on it. To tell the truth, Gretamara, I’m a little frightened of going on to Bray.”

“I know, dear. The unknown is frightening, but you have always known it was what you had to do.”

“Yes, but it was always some time in the future. Now it’s immediate, isn’t it. If it were not to be today, surely I would not be here, arranging all the legalities.”

I grinned at her. “Oh, that’s true enough, Lady. If it were not today, you would not be here, nor would I. I hope you feel the Gardener has taught you well.”

“Both of you have taught me to hold my tongue,” said Sophia meaningfully. “I have given you my oath to do so.”

Most of those who had attended the brief meeting had gone even as other delegates to Dominion began to arrive. Two Gentherans came toward us and introduced themselves as Mwrrr Lrrrpa and Prrr Prrrpm. I identified them to myself as smaller one and larger one.

Smaller one of them said, “Von Goldereau d’Lornschilde has just arrived. He’s over there by the door. He’s been badgering us for years to find the heiress of Bray, and we’re told she is here.” She turned her mirrored helmet toward Sophia. “We are told you have grown up in a little town on Chottem, in the care of our friend, the Gardener. Would you mind dreadfully if we made the introduction?”

Sophia turned to me with a slight, wicked grin. We had planned for her to meet Von Goldereau, either here or in Bray, so I said, very seriously, that the Gardener and I would both be delighted. The two Gentherans turned and went toward d’Lornschilde purposefully, while Sophia and I walked a less direct route that brought us up behind him just in time to hear the Gentheran crow, “…but now we have great news to impart, Delegate Von Goldereau d’Lornschilde! You may rejoice, Delegate. The heiress of Bray has been found!”

We could only see the back of Von Goldereau’s neck, which turned a peculiar ashen shade. “Found?” he choked. “Where did you find her?”

“Precisely where she has been all along, in the little village of Swylet-Upon-Sea, on Chottem, in the care of the Gardener.”

We had edged around a little so we were able to see that some color was returning into Von Goldereau’s face. “In the care of a gardener!”
He sneered. “She’ll be completely unschooled. She’ll be a bumpkin, a rustic, a peasant! Totally unable to accept the great responsibilities she will have to shoulder. It’s best that I take her in hand, I think. See that she’s educated properly…”

“Oh,” said the other Gentheran, the larger one, “we think that will be unnecessary, Delegate. She has been reared by a great friend of Genthera.”

The delegate’s skin fell back toward its former ashen shade. “Genthera? What had Gentherans to do with her?”

“Enough to assure she would be no bumpkin.”

“But she was left with some herb grower? Some vendor of vegetables?”

“Yes. With a great friend of our people.”

He could find nothing to say, not a word even when the smaller one nodded to us. Sophia threw back her cloak and hood and moved around in front of the man, so he could see the loveliest woman he had ever seen, the perfected image of Stentor d’Lorn’s daughter. She was dressed in the most recent style adopted by the wealthiest class in Bray, her hair tumbled about her head in a black cloud set with diamond stars, and when she offered her hand, the sparkle of stones from her fingers and wrists almost blinded him. Quite perfect! Just as the Gardener and I had planned it.

“Delegate,” she said in the cool, careless voice she had inherited from her mother and had long practiced to perfection, “I understand you have been looking for me.”

Von Goldereau found his voice, the upper register at any rate. “Only to offer any assistance I can.” He bowed low over her hand and would have kissed it had she not withdrawn it quickly. “May I offer to escort you to your home?”

“Thank you, no,” she replied. “Here at Dominion headquarters, I have been arranging for various things to be done in Bray. We have sent people there to attend to my business. They will see that the local legalities are taken care of, and they will offer proof of my identity. I will be returning there very shortly.”

“The Great House has been largely untenanted,” said Von Goldereau with a note of desperation. “Surely you will allow me to hire servants for you, to see to its being readied for your arrival.”

“Kind of you, but unnecessary, Delegate. Workers have already been dispatched, people I know and trust. Even as we speak, they are opening the house my grandfather built.”

He was at a loss, and I knew why. The Gentherans had been making unscheduled visits to Bray for some time, and it had become much harder for Von Goldereau d’Lornschilde to keep the family business operating in the way Von Goldereau, and Stentor d’Lorn before him, had preferred. There were things going on in Bray that he did not wish Dominion to learn of, that Dominion had not learned of, yet, however diligent its search. Certainly he didn’t want the heiress to know of them until he was sure where her allegiance lay. With Stentor d’Lorn, he would have been on solid ground, but with my friend, he was at sea.

I could read his thoughts on his face. He was thinking it might be best to miss the meeting of Dominion and hurry back to Bray. He was also thinking that, on the other hand, something might occur at the meeting that was important, and the other delegates from Chottem might take advantage of his absence. His eyes, his hands betrayed his thought. So caught between two fires, he saw Sophia’s amused expression, the look of one who read a clearly written book.

She said, “Von Goldereau, we are kinfolk. Please do not upset yourself over my return. Be assured that my friends throughout Dominion have the matter very well in hand. I am at the age of reason in Earth-years, the age we humans seem to feel appropriate for the acceptance of responsibility. At this age, we need no regents, no guardians, no overseers or protectors except those we have selected to oversee and to protect. Do not trouble yourself on my account.”

And with that she turned and swept away, glittering like a fountain, with people bowing as she went and me hurrying after her, trying not to laugh. It wasn’t funny. I knew that there was really nothing funny about it, and yet, for just a moment, I was delighted.

From behind me I heard the deeper-voiced Gentheran say: “Bumpkin, I think you said, Delegate d’Lornschilde. Or was it peasant?”

Von Goldereau did not reply. When we reached the door and looked back, we saw that he had gone. We both knew he was returning to Bray as quickly as possible.

Meantime, the heiress of Bray put her arm around me and said,
“That was interesting, don’t you think, Gretamara? The man is up to something.”

“If what the Gardener has told us is correct, Lady, we know the man is usually up to something, and something well beyond a bit of thievery or corruption. We will need to watch him.”

“When do we leave?”

“Now,” I said. “She’s waiting for us now.”

We went down to the smaller landing lock. There were several Gentherans standing about, staring in astonishment at the great golden dragonfly piloted by a woman in red robes, apparently a human woman. For many reasons, mere humanity seemed increasingly unlikely to me.

In the ship, the Gardener spoke softly. “The Gentherans back there are a bit confused. They have seen the ship; they have seen me. Among the cognoscenti I am rumored to be a member of the Third Order of the Siblinghood, as I was of the First and Second Orders. They saw me come to transport the heiress of Bray and her companion. Now they are retelling old tales in which my arrival always presaged great events. They are saying my arrival today cannot be coincidental.”

I asked, “Are there to be great events, Gardener?”

She said, “It is time you knew: The Third Order of the Siblinghood, as did two Orders before them, has been trying to solve the ‘human problem’ for a very long time.”

“The human problem?” I asked, somewhat offended.

She put her arm around me. “Forgive me, Gretamara, but your race as a whole has the unfailing habit of fouling its nest, ruining its environment, killing its original planet, and doing its best to kill any others to which it is moved. Because we love and admire the human race for its many good qualities, we call this not ‘the human condition,’ meaning an irrevocable state, but ‘the human problem,’ one we wish to solve. The effort has gone on for some millennia, without result, and some of those involved in the effort are beginning to believe it is a waste of time and treasure.