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07 - The Door Through Space - Marion Zimmer Bradley · Classic Science Fiction Books

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Chapter seven, Shaine Saw first in the chain of dry towns that lie in
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the bed of a long dried ocean. Is set at the center of a
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great alkali plain, a dusty, parched city bleached by a million years of
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sun. The houses are high, spreading buildings, with many rooms and wide
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windows. The poorer sort were made of sun dried brick, the more imposing,
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being cut from the bleached salt stone of the cliffs that rise behind the
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city. News travels fast in the dry towns. If Recall were in the
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city, he'd soon know that I was here and guess who I was or
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why I'd come. I might disguise myself so that my own sister or the
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mother who bore me would not know me. But I had no illusions about
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my ability to disguise myself from Recall. He had created the disguise that was
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me. When the second sun set, red and burning behind the salt cliffs,
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I knew he was not in Shane Saw, but I stayed on,
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waiting for something to happen. At night, I slept in a cubby hole
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behind a wine shop, paying an inordinate price for that very dubious privilege.
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And every day in the sleepy silence of the blood red noon, I paced
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the public square of Shainsah. This went on for four days. No one
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took the slightest notice of another nameless man in a shabby shirt cloak, without
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name or identity or known business. No one appeared to see me, except
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the dusty children with pale, fleecy hair, who played their patient games on
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the wind swept curbing of the square. They surveyed my scarred face with neither
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curiosity or fear, and it occurred to me that Rindy might be such another
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as these. If I had still been thinking like an earth man, I
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might have tried to question one of the children or win their confidence. But
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I had a deeper game in hand. On the fifth day, I was
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so much a fixture that my pacing went unnoticed even by the children. On
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the gray moss of the square, a few dried looking old men, their
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faces as faded as their shirt cloaks, and bearing the knife scars of a
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hundred forgotten flights, drowsed on the stone benches and along the flagged at the
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edge of the square. As suddenly as an autumn storm in the salt flats,
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a woman came walking. She was tall, with a proud, swinging
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walk, and a metallic clashing kept rhythm to her swift steps. Her arms
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were fettered, each wrist bound with a jeweled bracelet, and the bracelets linked
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together by a long silver gilt chain, passed through a silken loop at her
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waist. From the loop swung a tiny golden padlock, but in the lock
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stood an even tinier key, signifying that she was a higher caste than her
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husband or consort, and that her fettering was by choice and not command.
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She stopped directly before me and raised her arm in formal greeting like a man.
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The chain made a tinkling sound in the hushed square as her other hand
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was pulled up tight against the silken loop at her waist. She stood surveying
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me for a few moments, and finally I raised my head and returned her
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gaze. I don't know why I had expected her to have hair like spun
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black glass, and eyes that burned with the red reflection of the burning star.
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This woman's eyes were darker than the poison berries of the salt cliffs,
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and her mouth was a cut berry that looked just as dangerous. She was
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young, the slimness of her shoulders, and the narrow, steel chained wrists
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told me how very young she was, But her face had seen weather and
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storms, and her dark eyes had weathered worse psychic storms than that. She
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did not flinch at the sight of my scars, and met my gaze without
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dropping her eyes. You are a stranger. What is your business in Chainsaw?
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I met the direct question with the insolence it demanded, hardly moving my
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lips. I have come to buy women for the brothels of Ardkoran. Perhaps
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when washed, you might be suitable. Who could arrange for your sail?
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She took the rebuke impassively, though the bitter crimson of her mouth twitched a
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little in mischief or rage, but she made no sign. The battle was
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joined between us, and I knew already that it would be fought to the
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end. From somewhere in her draperies, something fell to the ground with a
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little tinkle, But I knew that trick too, and I did not move.
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Finally, she went away without bending tretrieve it. And when I looked
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around, I saw that all the fleecehaired children had stolen away, leaving their
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playthings lying on the curb. But one or two of the gaffers on the
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stone benches, who were old enough to show curiosity without losing face, were
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watching me with impassive eyes. I could have asked the woman's name then,
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but I held back, knowing it could only lessen the prestige I had gained
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from the encounter. I glanced down, without seeming to do so, at
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the tiny mirror which had fallen from the recesses of the fur robe. Her
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name might have been inscribed on the reverse, but I left it lying there
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to be picked up by the children when they returned and went back to the
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wine shop. I had accomplished my first objective. If you can't be inconspicuous,
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be so damned conspicuous that nobody can miss you. And that in itself
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is a fair concealment. How many people can accurately describe a street riot.
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I was finishing off a bad meal with a stone bottle of worse wine when
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the chalk came in. Disregarded the proprietor and made straight for me. He
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was furred immaculately white. His velvet muzzle was contracted as if the very smells
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might soil it, and he kept a dainty paw outstretched to ward off accidental
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contact with greasy counters or tables or tapestries. His fur was scented and his
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throat circled with a collar of embroidered silk. This pampered minion surveyed me with
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the innocent malice of an uninvolved non human for merely human intrigues, You are
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wanted in the great House of Shanithath guard Man. He spoke the Shainsaw dialect
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with an affected lisp. Will it please you to come with me? I
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came with no more than polite protest, but was startled. I had not
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expected the encounter to reach the great house so soon. Shainsa's Great House had
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changed hands four times since I had last been in Shainsaw. I wasn't overly
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anxious to appear there. The white chalk as out of place in the rough,
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dry town as a jewel in the streets or a rain drop in the
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desert. Led me along a winding, bold boulevard to an outlying district.
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He made no attempt to engage me in conversation, and indeed I got the
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distinct impression that this coxcomb of a non human considered me well Beneath his notice
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he seemed much more aware of the blowing dust in the street, which ruffled
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and smudged his carefully combed fur. The great house was carved from blocks of
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rough, pink basalt, the entry guarded by two great Carryadids, and wrapped
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in chains of carved metal set somehow into the surface of the basalt. The
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guilt had long ago worn away from the chains, so that it alternately gleamed
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gold or smudged base metal. The Caryadids were patient and blind, their jewel
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eyes long vanished under a hotter sun than to day's. The entrance hall was
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enormous. A Terran starship could have stood upright inside. It was my first
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impression, but I dismissed that thought quickly. Any Terran thought was apt to
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betray me. But the main hall was built on a scale even more huge,
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and it was even colder than the legendary hell of the Chalks. It
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was far too big for the people in it. There was a little solar
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heater in the ceiling, but it didn't help much. A dim glow came
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from a metal brazier, but that didn't help much either. The chalk melted
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into the shadows, and I went down the steps into the hall by myself,
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feeling carefully for each step with my feet, and trying not to seem
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to be doing so. My comparative night blindness is the only significant way in
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which I really differ from a native wolfin There were three men, two women,
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and a child in the room. They were all dry towners and had
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an obscure family likeness, and they all wore rich garments of fur dyed in
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many colors. One of the men, old and stooped and withered, was
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doing something to the brazier. A slim boy of fourteen was sitting cross legged
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on a pile of cushions in the corner. There was something wrong with his
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legs. A girl of ten, in a too short smock that showed long,
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spider thin legs above her low leather boots, was playing with some sort
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of shimmery crystals, spilling them out into patterns and scooping them up again from
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the uneven stones of the floor. One of the women was a fat,
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creased slattern whose jewels and dyed furs did not disguise her greasy slovenliness. Her
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hands were unchained, and she was biting into a fruit which dripped red juice
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down the rich blue fur of her robe. The old man gave her a
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look like murder as I came in, and she straightened slightly, but did
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not discard the fruit. The whole room had a curious look of austere,
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dignified poverty, to which the fat woman was the only discordant note. But
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it was the remaining man and woman who drew my attention, so that I
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noticed the others only peripherally in their outermost orbit. One was Kirral, standing
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at the foot of the dais and glowering at me. The other was the
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dark eyed woman I had rebuked to day in the public square. Kirral said,
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so it's you, and his voice held nothing, not rebuke, not
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friendliness or lack of it, not even hatred. Nothing. There was only
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one way to meet it. I faced the girl. She was sitting on
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a throne like chair next to the fat woman and looked like a doe next
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to a pig, and said boldly, I assume this summons to mean that
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you informed your kinsmen of my offer. She flushed, and that was triumph
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enough. I held back the triumph, however, warry of overconfidence. The
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gaffer laughed. The high cackle of age, and Kirral broke in with a
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sharp, angry monosyllable, by which I knew that my remark had indeed been
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repeated, and had lost nothing in the telling. But only the line of
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his jaw betrayed the anger, as he said, calmly, be quiet,
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Delissa. Where did you pick this up? I said boldly? The Great
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House has changed rulers since last I smelled the salt cliffs. Newcomers do not
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know my name, and theirs is unknown to me, the old gaffer said
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thinly to Karl, our name has lost Kihar. One daughter is lured away
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by the toy maker, and another babbles with strangers in the square, and
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a homeless no good of the streets does not know our name. My eyes,
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growing accustomed to the dark blaze of the brazier, saw that Kiral was
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biting his lip and scowling. Then he gesture to a table where an array
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of glassware was set, and at the gesture the white chalk came on noiseless
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feet and poured wine. If you have no blood feud with my family,
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will you drink with me? I will, I said, relaxing, Even
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if he had associated the trader with the scarred earthmen of the spaceport. He
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seemed to have decided to drop the matter. He seemed startled, but he
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waited until I had lifted the glass and taken a sip. Then, with
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a movement like lightning, he leaped from the dais and struck the glass from
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my lips. I staggered back, wiping my cut mouth in a split second,
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juggling possibilities. The insult was terrible and deadly. I could do nothing
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now but fight men had been murdered in Chainsaw for far less. I had
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come to settle one feud, not involve myself in another. But even while
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these lightning thoughts flickered in my mind, I had whipped out my skin,
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and I was surprised at the shrillness of my own voice. You can drive
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a fence beneath your own roof, spy and renegade, ki all thundered.
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He did not touch his skein. From the table. He caught a long,
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forethonged whip, making it whistle through the air. The long legged child
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scuttled backward. I stepped back one pace, trying to conceal my desperate puzzlement.
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I could not guess what had prompted Kiral's attack, But whatever it was,
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I must have made some bad mistake and could count myself lucky to get
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out of there alive. Kirral's voice perceptibly trembled with rage. You dare to
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come into my own home after I have tracked you to the cars and back,
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blind fool that I was, But now you shall pay. The whip
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sang through the air, hissing past my shoulders. I dodged to one side,
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retreating step by step as Kiral swung the powerful thongs. It cracked again,
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and a pain like the burning of red hot iron seared my upper arm.
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My skein rattled down from numb fingers. The whip whacked the floor.
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Pick up your skin, said Karol, pick it up if your dare.
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He poised the lash again. The fat woman screamed. I stood rigid,
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gaging my chances of disarming him with a sudden leap. Suddenly, the girl
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Dollissa leaped from her seat with a harsh, musical chiming of chains. Kiral,
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No, no, Kira. He moved slightly, but did not take
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his eyes from me. Get back, Dollisa, no wait. She ran
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to him and caught his whip arm, dragging it down and spoke to him
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hurriedly and urgently. Kirl's face changed as she spoke. He drew a long
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breath and threw the whip down beside my skin on the floor. Answer straight
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on your life, what are you doing in shane Saw? I could hardly
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take it in that for the moment I was reprieved from sudden death, from
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being beaten into bloody death here at Karol's feet. The girl went back to
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her throne like chair. Now I must either tell the truth or a convincing
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lie, and I was lost in a game where I didn't know the rules.
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The explanation I thought might get me out alive might be the very one
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which would bring down instant and painful death. Suddenly, with a poignancy that
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was almost pain, I wish Rakhal were standing here at my side, but
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I had to bluff it out alone. If they had recognized me for Race
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Cargle, the Terran spy who had often been in Shainsaw, they might release
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me. It was possible, I supposed that they were tearing sympathizers. On
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the other hand, Kiral's shouts of spy renegade seemed to suggest the opposite.
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I stood trying to ignore the searing pain in my lashed arm, but I
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knew that blood was running hot down my shoulder. Finally, I said,
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I came to settle blood feud. Kirrall's lips thinned in what might have been
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meant for a smile. You shall, assuredly, but with whom remains to
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be seen. Knowing I had nothing more to lose, I said, with
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a renegade, called recall Censar. Only the old man echoed my words,
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dully, recall Censar. I felt heartened, seeing I wasn't dead yet I
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have sworn to kill him. Kirraal suddenly clapped his hands and shouted to the
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white chalk to clean up the broken glass on the floor. He said,
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huskily, you are not yourself. Recall Censar. I told you he wasn't,
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said Dallisa, high and hysterical. I told you he wasn't a scarred
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man tall. What was I to think? Kirral sounded and looked badly shaken.
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He filled a glass himself and handed it to me, saying, hoarsely,
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I did not believe even the renegade recall would break the codes. So
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far as to drink with me, he would not. I could be positive
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about this. The codes of Terra had made some superficial impress on Recall,
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but down deep his own world held sway. If these men were at blood
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feud with Recall, and he stood here where I stood, he would have
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let himself be beaten into bloody rags before tasting their wine. I took the
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glass, raised it, and drained it, Then holding it out for more,
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I said, Recall's life is mine. But I swear by the red
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star, and by the unmoving mountains, by the black snow, and by
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the ghost wind, I have no quarrel with any beneath this roof. I
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cast the glass to the floor, where it shattered on the stones. Kirol
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hesitated, but under the blazing eyes of the girl, he quickly poured himself
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a glass of wine and drank a few SIPs, then flung down the glass.
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He stepped forward and laid his hands on my shoulders. I winced as
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he touched the welt of the lash, and could not raise my own arm
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to complete the ceremonial toast. Kill stepped away, shrugged. Shall I have
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one of the women see to your hurt? He looked at Dalisa, but
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she twisted her mouth. Do it yourself. It is nothing, I said,
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not truthfully. But I demand in requital that, since we are bound
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by spilled blood under your roof, that you give me what news you have
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of Recall this spy and renegade, Kiral said, fiercely. If I knew,
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would I be under my own roof. The old gaffer on the days
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broke into shrill, whining laughter. You have drunk with him, Kiirral.
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Now he's bound you not to do him harm. I know the story of
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Racal. He was a spy for Terra twelve years twelve years, and then
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he fought and flung their filthy money in their faces and left them. But
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his partner was some dry town half breed or Terran spy. And they fought
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with clawed gloves and near killed one another, except the Terrans, who have
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no honor, stopped em. See the marks of the Kafirra on his face,
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by sharer the golden chained, said Kiral, gazing at me with something
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like a grin. You are, if nothing else, a very clever man.
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What are you spy or half caste, some ard koran slut? What
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I am doesn't matter to you, I said. You have blood feud with
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Recall, but mine is older than yours, and his life is mine.
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As you are bound in honor to kill. The formal phrases came easily now
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to my tongue. The earth man had slipped away. So you are bound
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in honor to help me kill. If anyone beneath your roof knows anything of
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Recall, Kirraal's smile bared his teeth. Recall works against the son of the
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Ape, he said, using the insulting wolf term for the Terrans. If
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we help you to kill him, we remove a gode from our flanks.
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I prefer to let the filthy Tehranin spend their strength trying to remove it themselves.
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Moreover, I believe you are yourself an earth man. You have no
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right to the courtesy I extend to we the people of the sky. Yet
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you have drunk wine with me, and I have no quarrel with you.
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He raised his hand in dismissal, out fencing me. Leave my roof in
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safety and my city with honor. I could not protest or plead a man's
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kihar. His personal dignity is a precious thing in Shainsa, and he had
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placed me, so I could not compromise mine further in words. Yet I
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lost Kirrhal equally if I left at his bidding like an inferior dismissed one desperate
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gamble remained a word, I said, raising my hand, and while he
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half turned startled, believing I was indeed about to compromise my dignity by a
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further plea, I flung it at him. I will bet schegriy with you.
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His iron composure looked shaken. I had delivered a blow to his belief
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that I was an earth Man. For it is doubtful if there are six
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earthmen on Wolf who know about Schegri, the dangerous game of the dry towns.
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It is no ordinary gamble, for what the better stakes is his life,
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possibly his reason. Rarely indeed will a man beg Schegri unless he has
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nothing further to lose. It is a cruel, possibly decadent game, which
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has no parallel anywhere in the known universe. But I had no choice.
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I had struck a cold trail in Shainsaw, recal might be anywhere on the
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planet, and half of Magnuson's month was already up unless I could force Kirol
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to tell what he knew, I might as well quit. So I repeated,
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I will bet Chegri with you, and Kial stood unmoving. For what
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the Chagrin wagers is his courage and endurance in the face of torture and an
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unknown fate on his side. The stakes are clearly determined beforehand. But if
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he loses, his punishment or penalty is at the whim of the one who
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has accepted him, and he may be put to whatever doom the winner determines.
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And this is the contest. The Chagrin permits himself to be tortured from
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sunrise to sunset. If he endures, he wins. It is as simple
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as that he can stop the torture at any moment by a word, but
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to do so is a concession of defeat. This is not as dangerous as
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it might at first seem. The other party to the bet is bound by
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the ironclad codes of Wolf to inflict no permanent physical damage, no injury that
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will not heal with three sun courses. But from sunrise to sunset, any
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torment or painful ingenuity which the half human mentality of Wolf can devise must be
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endured. The man who can outthink the torture of the moment, the man
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who can hold in his mind the single thought of his goal. That man
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can claim the stakes he has set, as well as other concessions made traditional.
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The silence grew in the hall. Dallisa had straightened and was watching me
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intently, her lips parted and the tip of a little red tongue visible between
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her teeth. The only sound was the tiny crunching as the fat woman nibbled
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at nuts and cast their shells into the brazier. Even the child on the
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steps had abandoned her game with the crystal dice and sat looking up at me
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with her mouth open. Finally, Kirral demanded, your stakes, tell me
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all you know of Recall, Censar, and keep silence about me and shainsa
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by the red shadow. Kirall burst out, You have courage, Rascar,
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say only yes or no, I retorted, rebuked. He fell silent.
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Dalisa leaned forward and again, for some unknown reason, I thought of a
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girl with hair like spun black glass. Kirall raised his hand. I say
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no, I have blood feud with Recall, and I will not sell his
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death to another. Further, I believe you are Terran and I will not
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deal with you. And finally, you have twice saved my life, and
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I would find small pleasure in torturing you. I say no, drink again
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with me, and we part without a quarrel. Beaten, I turned to
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go, wait, said Dallisa. She stood up and came down the dais
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slowly, this time walking with dignity to the rhythm of her musically clashing chains.
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I have a quarrel with this man. I started to say that I
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did not quarrel with women, and stopped myself. The Terran concept of chivalry
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has no equivalent on wolf. She looked at me with her dark poison berry
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eyes, icy and level, and amused, and said, I will bet
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schegri with you unless you fear me Rascar and I knew suddenly that if I
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lost, I might better have trusted myself to Kraal and his whip or to
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the wild beast things of the mountains. End of chapter seven