Ice and Shadow (12 page)

It seemed that Ludorica was aware only of what she held, not of those around her. She was flanked by a man in black who eyed her with almost as deep a fascination as she used for the Crown. On her other side was Reddick. He held one of those massive hand weapons and from its barrel still rose a thread of smoke fume.

Two of Imfry’s followers lay still against the wall near where Roane crouched. And the Colonel himself—Roane’s hand went to her mouth—his back was to the rock as if he needed support. One arm hung limp and there was a dark stain spreading on his shoulder. But he was being roughly bound by two of Reddick’s men, while two more stood with hand weapons trained on Imfry’s remaining men.

“The King is dead—long live the Queen,” Reddick intoned. Then he added, touching Ludorica’s arm, “My Queen, what would you have us do with these who came to seek the great treasure of Reveny?”

She did not raise her head or look away from what she held. When she answered her voice was thin and lacking in warmth, as if she spoke from a far distance of things which mattered little.

“Since I am Queen, as all can see, let them be served as traitors, for they reached for the Crown!”

Reddick smiled. But on the faces of the Colonel and of his remaining men there was shock, as if they could not believe what they had heard.

“The King being dead, our Queen has spoken,” Reddick said. There was a solemnity to his words, as if he were some official of a court of justice relaying a lawful verdict. “Let them be dealt with as traitors. My Queen”—he turned again to Ludorica—“this is no fit place for you. Let us ride to show your people that you are truly their crowned one.”

There was a hint of another emotion on Ludorica’s face as that mask which so repelled Roane changed a little. “Yes”—now her voice was more human, eager—“let me do so! This is the Ice Crown; I hold it, I wear it, for Reveny!”

Looking neither right nor left, and certainly not at the men she had so summarily condemned, she went to the newly cut opening, the man in black beside her putting out a steadying hand now and then. For she paid no attention to her footing, only to what she held. But Reddick lingered, watching his men bind the rest of Imfry’s force. When that was finished he spoke directly to the Colonel.

“The Crown has spoken, as it always does, my brave Colonel. I think that there is certainly a new day dawning for Reveny, but I do not believe it will be greatly to your taste. So perhaps it is best that you will leave us soon. Her Majesty will give the final word as to the hour and the manner of your going. But do not, I beg you, place any hope in old friendships. It is well known that the crowns always change those who wear them. It will be most interesting to see what changes will ensue once our liege lady is firmly on her throne.”

“Mind-globe cannot hold her forever.” Some of the stupefaction had gone from the Colonel now.

“Mind-globe? Ah, we might have used such a key to bring her here—since she alone could handle the Crown. But I assure you, my brave and interfering Colonel, what has passed since then is born of the Crown alone. To rule and reign is very different from living as an heiress to such glories. I think we shall find the Princess is no longer as you have always known her, but now a Queen! We must be riding. Bring these along—but intact,” he ordered his men. “It will doubtless please Her Majesty to make an excellent example of them.”

Roane had been so startled by the abrupt reversal of Ludorica’s attitude toward the Colonel that she had watched the scene without any thought of taking a hand in the action. But now, as Reddick’s men prepared to drag their prisoners away, she readied her stunner. She might not be any longer a part of Imfry’s efforts on behalf of one who had so strangely repudiated him, but neither could she see Reddick take him to his death.

But as she raised her weapon she was seized from behind, held in a viselike grip which did not allow her the slightest movement. And she heard the softest of whispers close to her ear:

“Not this time, you fool! This is no game for our playing.”

Sandar! How he had got there—or why—Roane writhed but was unable to move any more than he allowed her. Using his superior strength, he forced her backward, so she could no longer see the cave of the Crown.

She continued to fight his hold until they reached a wider stretch of passage. There he slammed her against the wall, holding her pinned by his weight against her. There was no light, but she could hear the cold menace in his voice.

“Do you want to be stun-rayed and dragged back? I will do it if necessary. You’ve played the fool and worse. But you’re through now with such tricks. What happens to these puppets is no concern of yours. They
are
puppets, we’ve seen enough to know that. They are programed just like Adrianian androids to do exactly what the machines back in that chamber tell them to do. What does it matter what games puppets play? We’ve learned a lot from those installations—”

“They are not puppets!” Roane denied in a burst of real rage. “Any more than we are when we are Cram-briefed. If they did not have the crowns—if those machines weren’t running—they would be free—They are human!”

“But they are not.” He continued to hold her in that bruising grip which hurt her. “They are acting out the lives the machines decide for them. And it is none of our concern. If the Service decides later to interfere, when they have our report, that is another matter. But it is not for us to worry about. Now—are you going to walk—or do I stun and drag you?”

CHAPTER 12

THERE WAS NO STRUGGLING WITH SANDAR.
She knew he would do exactly as he threatened.

“I will come,” she said dully.

He did not release his hold on her right shoulder, and so linked, they returned to the wider passage, where they were caught in the ray of a beamer. She heard her uncle give a sigh of relief.

“Hurry!” He did not ask where Sandar had been, nor what Roane had done. The beamer swung around, pointed their way to the entrance. Her cousin gave her a savage push.

As they emerged into the open a haze of mist lay in clots of shadow beneath the trees, seeping out over the country. Neither of the men hesitated, but struck a direct path back to camp, passing without note the man Roane had stunned, Sandar still holding her as if he expected her to break for freedom.

“Distorts out—all except one.” Sandar had taken a reading on his belt instrument.

“To be expected. They have not been recharged,” her uncle replied tersely. “The sooner we get off-world the better. I don’t know how much of an impression your stupid actions have made here.” He favored Roane with one of those icy stares which he had used to subdue her for so long. “We can only hope that we can lift without fully blowing cover—”

“What about the installation?” For the first time since she could remember, Roane dared to ask a question in the face of his quelling. “Are we going to—will the Service—just leave it running? Sandar says that all the people here are tied to it, that it makes them puppets. That’s against the Prime Four ruling—”

“Closed planets, as you well know, do not come under the Prime Rules. What the Service chooses to do once our report is in is none of our concern.”

He spoke as if that was the final word on the subject, and Roane knew the folly of further argument. But her cold fear of the installation stayed with her.

The Psychocrats had once forced men on unknown worlds into experiments. And when their horrible reign had been finally broken, their mind-slaves freed, the results of both the meddling and the liberation had been, for two generations now, a dire warning to all humankind. Even if she had not known Ludorica or the Colonel, had not been herself sucked into the web which enmeshed Clio, Roane would still have been aroused to anger by this discovery. Just as the people of Clio were conditioned to obey the machines their enslavers had set up generations ago, so was she armed to fight such influences. Sandar might name them puppets, which perhaps technically they were, but Roane had lived with them. And they were real people, far warmer of nature than the two now hustling her along.

Leave all major decisions to the Service—the safe, sane cry. But if this was left to the deliberation of men half the galaxy away, how soon would they interfere, if at all? Certainly not in time to save the Colonel! She had no doubts that Reddick would do exactly as he promised and make very sure Nelis Imfry was removed.

And the Princess with the Crown—she had been a changed person, almost evil. Ludorica deserved better than such slavery. Roane’s thoughts circled round and round the same cheerless path as she trotted along. She did not believe that she was now under that curious influence the Princess had exerted on her. But neither could she turn aside from the probable dark future of Reveny and the new Queen.

Sandar pushed her into the shelter on his father’s heels and then went to gather up the distorts. Uncle Offlas paid no attention to her, but went straight to the com to look for any messages recorded during their absence. He put out a finger to flick across the top of the machine, as if that gesture could summon an answer. Roane guessed that nothing had been received.

Uncle Offlas sat down and drew out the recorder. He was about to plunge in the button when he had a clear view of the reading. Then, for the first time since they had left the cave, he turned to look at her.

“There has been a recording made.” Though that was a statement rather than a question, she answered him:

“I made it, when I returned here.” And Roane knew a very small flash of triumph. He could not erase what she had done, for that tape was locked with the sequence of others.

But he was not frowning. In fact there was a trace of interest in his expression, almost as if she had as much value as some small find.

“And what did you record—your meddling?” Still no coldness in his tone. It was as if he honestly wanted to know. Her spirits rose a little. It could well be that what she had fed into the records might have some influence on the momentous future decision. Though that could not possibly help what was passing now. She moved restlessly—the thought of Imfry as she had last seen him, wounded, bound, very much in the power of his enemy, was a constant prod to action. But how, when, and where?

“What happened to me,” she replied. Then she gathered what courage she had recently gained—to stand against a lifetime of domination—and made her plea a second time:

“They—the Duke Reddick—is going to have the Colonel killed. The Princess is under controls. It is all like the tales of the story tapes, the ones about evil spells. The Colonel is her friend, but she ordered him executed. Only she could not mean it—it was that machine! We can’t let her do it—”

She expected him to dismiss her summarily. Instead he continued to watch her with deepening interest. But what had been at first encouraging no longer seemed so. It was as if
she
were a part of the installation and he was fascinated by her reactions. And at that moment she was convinced that if anything could be done to break the black pattern now being woven, she alone must do it.

“You like these people, feel a certain kinship to them?”

“Yes.”

“Well, you
had
recently come from intensive briefing. That might explain why you would be more susceptible to the influence of a strong conditioning broadcast, even if it were alien. There is good evidence that the installation here maintains Basic as well as special directional broadcasts. I think, Roane, that perhaps once you are debriefed, you will find the Service will accept such an explanation for your extraordinary conduct. In fact”—he was warming to this disagreeable train of thought—“you could well provide them with an additional check here. But as for any more interference on our part—you must understand that that is completely out of the question.

“In the first place, to stop—if we could find a method of doing so—any of those machines would disrupt the patterns they have been weaving for a couple of centuries, and the people of Clio may be so tied to their influence that failure of control would be fatal. Have you thought of that?”

Roane blinked. That the control could be so far-reaching, no, she had not thought of that. On the other hand, it was a dire possibility. They knew something of what the Psychocrats had done to manipulate their human material, but they did not know all. Patient reprograming was one thing; sudden and complete cutoff was another. Clio might be brought out of her fog by degrees, but the cutoffs—Roane remembered Ludorica’s tale of the country whose crown had been destroyed.

“Arothner—”

“What?”

“There was a seacoast country—” She outlined the story as the Princess had told it.

Uncle Offlas nodded. “You see, the crowns control the rulers directly, and perhaps indirectly most of the ruled. Destroy the crown and the people are as Sorfalan puppets when their motive power fails. This ‘Ice Crown’ had been lost for a couple of generations—but it was still in existence. The pattern broadcast by the machine had been interrupted. It could be that when the Princess found the Crown there was a sharp change to compensate and bring the country back into a determined future. This abrupt about-face could be the result of some such need—”

“Need!” Roane interrupted him. “To let
Reddick
dictate—and she was changed—evil—You may not believe me, but she was! And as for pattern—wasn’t it true that the closed worlds were supposed to be given a basic background and then allowed to work out their destinies from that? That the whole purpose of these experiments was to watch such maturing?”

“That was our conception, up until we made the discovery here. But it would seem that we were wrong. We came here for Forerunner relics, but we may have found something of equal value. There is every reason to believe that this is not a basic control but a self-continuing experiment.”

He turned to the recorder. “I must tape what we have learned. Remember, no more interference. If it is necessary”—his voice was once more cold—“we can put you in stass until we are back on the ship. No more action apart from what is necessary for the carrying out of our mission. Leave your belt here—” He pointed to the table before him.

So he would take from her the means of any independent action. Roane pressed open the catch. As she laid it before him he added:

“You had better break out provisions. Double rations.”

Sluggishly she went to obey. The lift which the session in the fresher had given her was wearing off. Even if she managed by some now unforeseen chance to get away from the camp, she would not have the strength to reach Hitherhow. And without even a stunner, what good would revolt do her?

Roane brought out tubes and containers. Double rations? For a moment her thoughts lifted from the narrow rut of her troubles. She heard Sandar come in. And having loaded a tray with her choices, she returned to the com.

“I do not understand their silence. No reply to our urgent signal. Surely they cannot have broken orbit! Or if some such crisis arose, they would have beamed a warning.” Uncle Offlas was again tapping the com.

“One distort with about a quarter power left.” Sandar was piling boxes on the floor. “The rest are gone. There is a drain, there must be! To need full recharging so soon—”

“We have no idea about that installation. It may well be that it can pull from any power source in the neighborhood.”

“But if that is so,” Sandar said eagerly, “such an effect might be reversed. We could tap from it, maybe build up a real force wall to hold until the retire signal comes.”

“Too risky.” His father shook his head. “But your thought leads to something else. We cannot recharge the distorts now without endangering our com broadcast. And to remain in this unprotected camp—I don’t like the thought of that.”

“Strike this shelter—move into better hiding?” Sandar suggested.

“It might be well. Unless we get an answer soon.”

“So far the forest seems clear around here,” Sandar reported. “We could go back to the cave, set up a repeller at the mouth. They have their crown now. I don’t think they’ll come back.”

Roane divided the food containers, took her share. With a tube and two small boxes she went to her own quarters. Sleep was so heavy upon her that she had to force her eyelids open, keep doggedly chewing and swallowing. But before she had finished she lost the battle and was asleep.

Dreams were not uncommon. One often dreamed. Roane had wandered so in many strange places, some of them far stranger than the alien worlds she had seen with waking eyes. But this was the most vivid and “real” dream she had ever known, though in it she was only a spectator.

It was as if she had walked through the curtain of sleep into such a room as she had seen in the ambassador’s mansion in Gastonhow. There were chairs with tall, much-carved backs, portions of that carving touched with insets of metal, or with time-dulled paint, to make fantastic scenes. Behind them much of the wall was covered with a stretch of tapestry on which men mounted on duocorns hunted some quarry lost from sight in thread-formed trees. This, too, had the look of something faded by many years’ passing.

Yet it was as sharply clear to Roane’s eyes as if she stood there in body. Before her was a long table of rich red stone which bore on its surface a mottling of twisting green lines. And set out on this was a plate of gold. By that lay a set of knife, two-tined fork, and spoon, all fashioned of crystal ringed and banded with gold in which small green gems were set.

At a good, almost awkward distance away from this setting was a second. But here the plate was of silver, the eating implements of the same material, with handles of red. All had a richness of color which warmed Roane as had her surroundings in Gastonhow—though it was far removed from the more sophisticated trappings of her own civilization.

The room lacked occupants, but there was a kind of expectancy. Roane was keenly aware that she waited with rising excitement for some action of importance.

A man wearing a richly embroidered tabard backed in, bowing low at every step to the person he ushered through the portal. He had a staff in one hand and he brought the butt of that sharply down on the floor at intervals. If his action was some signal Roane heard no sound, nor, she was suddenly aware, had she heard any since her eyes had opened on this.

She whom the usher had so heralded entered, her full skirts skimming in graceful folds which she adjusted now and then with small movements of one hand. In the other she carried a flat fan of purple feathers mounted on a jeweled handle.

The skirts, with tight bodice, cut low enough to reveal much of her shoulders, were of a deep purple shade, the lacings of the bodice black interwoven with silver. And the wide necklace of many drops, the earrings her elaborately dressed hair allowed to show, were of shining black stones. There was even a small circlet of them in her hair. There was no mistaking who walked thus—the Queen Ludorica.

Two ladies followed her, their dresses of a like cut, but of gray with laces of unrelieved black. They had ribbons of the same hue tied around their throats, and their heads were covered with lacy black veils. The whole effect was one of calculated somberness.

One stationed herself at the table to face the Queen, while the other remained by the door—though not so as to obstruct the entrance of the fifth member of the party—Duke Reddick.

His clothing was also purple, a duller shade than worn by the Queen. He passed around the table, drew out her chair and seated her with ceremony before he took that place at some distance from her.

A tray was handed in from beyond the door to the waiting lady, who brought it to her companion at the table. From it the latter took two fantastic cups wrought in the form of those grotesque animals Roane had first seen being set up in the garden at Hitherhow. Having filled them from a flagon, she set them on the table with care, touched each lightly on the side. Straightway the metal feet moved and the cups started on a stately march, one to Ludorica, one to the Duke.