The Memory of Earth (31 page)

“My brothers will also witness that Father is alive.”

“And where are
they
?”

Elemak almost blurted out the fact that they were hiding not very far from the city walls. Then he realized that this was almost certainly what Gaballufix wanted most to know—who Elemak’s allies were, and where they were hiding. “You don’t think I’d enter the city alone, do
you, when my brothers are as eager to come back to Basilica as I am!”

Of course Gaballufix knew that Elemak was lying—or, at the least, he knew that Elemak’s thumbprint was the only one that had shown up at any of the city gates. What Gabya couldn’t know was whether Elemak was merely bluffing, and his brothers were all far away in the desert—or whether they had circumvented the guards at the gates and even now were in the city, plotting some mischief that Gaballufix would need to worry about. Yet Gaballufix couldn’t say anything about the fact that he knew Elemak was the only one to enter the city legally—it would be as much as admitting that he had complete access to the city’s computers.

“I’m glad they were able to return to the pleasures of the city,” said Gabya. “I hope they’re careful though. A rough element has been brought into the city—mostly by Roptat and his gang, I’m afraid—and even though I’m helping the city by letting a few of my employees put in extra duty hours patrolling the streets, it’s still possible for young men wandering alone through the city to get involved in unfortunate incidents. Sometimes dangerous ones.”

“I’ll warn them to look out.”

“And you, too, Elemak. I worry for you, my brother. There are those who think your father was involved in a plot against Roptat. What if they take out their resentment on
you
?”

At that moment Elemak realized that his mission had failed. Gabya clearly
did
believe that Elemak had betrayed him—or else had concluded that Elemak was no longer useful and might even be dangerous enough to be worth killing. There was no hope now of getting anything through a pretense of polite brotherliness. But it might be worth taking a different tack.

“Come now, Gabya,” said Elemak, “you know that you’re the one who’s been putting out that story about Father plotting against Roptat. That was the plan, remember? For Father to be found in the coolhouse with Roptat’s murdered corpse. He wouldn’t be convicted, but he’d be implicated, discredited. Only Father didn’t come, and therefore Roptat wouldn’t get close enough for your thugs to kill him, and now you’re trying to salvage as much of the plan as you can. We sat here and talked about it—why should we pretend now that we don’t both know exactly what’s going on?”

“But we
don’t
both know what’s going on,” said Gaballufix. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

Elemak looked at him with contempt. “And to think I once believed you were capable of leading Basilica to greatness. You couldn’t even neutralize your opposition when you had the chance.”

“I was betrayed by fools and cowards,” said Gaballufix.

“That’s the excuse that fools and cowards always give for their failures—and it’s always true, as long as you realize that it’s self-betrayal they’re talking about.”

“You call
me
a fool and a coward?” Gaballufix was angry now, losing control. Elemak had never seen him like this, except a flash of temper now and then. He wasn’t sure that he could handle this, but at least it wasn’t the suave indifference that Gabya had been showing him till now. “At least I didn’t sneak off in the middle of the night,” said Gaballufix. “At least I didn’t believe every story I was told, no matter how idiotic it was.”

“And I did?” asked Elemak. “You forget, Gabya,
you
were the only one telling me stories. So now, I’d like to know, which of the stories was I idiotic to believe? That you were only acting in the best interests of Basilica? I never believed that one—I knew you were out for your
own profit and your own power. Or perhaps you think I believed the story that you really loved my father and were really trying to protect him from getting into the political situation over his head. Do you think I actually believed
that
one? You’ve hated him since Lady Rasa lapsed you and remated with him, and you’ve hated him more every year that they’ve stayed together.”

“I never cared about that!” said Gaballufix. “She’s nothing to me!”

“Even now she’s the only audience you try to please—imagine, going to her house and strutting like some cockbird, showing off for her. You should hear how she laughs about you now.” Elemak knew, of course, that saying such a thing put Rasa in great danger—but this was a game with high risks, and Elemak couldn’t hope to win it unless he took some chances. Besides, Lady Rasa could handle Gaballufix.

“Laughs? She doesn’t laugh. You haven’t even spoken with her.”

“Look at me—do you see any of the filth of travel on my clothing? I bathed in her house. I’m going to mate with her favorite niece. She told me that she would as soon have mated with a rabbit as to spend another night with you.”

For a moment he thought Gaballufix would draw a weapon and kill him on the spot. Then Gabya’s face relaxed a little, into something like a smile. “Now I
know
you’re lying,” he said. “Rasa would never say something so crude.”

“Of course I made it up,” said Elemak. “I just wanted you to see who was the fool, believing any story that he heard.”

“It’s one thing to believe for a moment,” said Gaballufix. “It’s another story to keep believing and believing in the stupidest ideas.”

It was in that moment that it first dawned on Elemak what the lie was that Gaballufix was saying he still believed. And Gabya was right—Elemak was a fool ever to have believed it, and a worse fool to have kept on believing it until now. “You never meant to charge Father with killing Roptat, did you?”

“Of course I did,” said Gabya.

“But not to bring him to trial.”

“Oh, no, that would be silly—a waste of time. I told you that.”

“You
said
it would be a waste of time because Father’s prestige in the city meant he’d never be convicted. But the truth was he would never have come to trial because you meant people to discover both Roptat’s
and
Father’s bodies in the coolhouse.”

“What a terrible accusation. I deny it all. You have such an evil imagination,
boy
.”

“You were using me to betray my own father so you could
kill
him.”

“For the longest time,” said Gaballufix, “I assumed you knew that. I assumed you understood that we were simply not speaking directly about it because it was such an unpleasant subject. I thought you realized that the only way I could get you your inheritance early was by arranging your father’s death.”

Elemak’s fury at having almost been a conspirator in father-killing overwhelmed all his self-control. He lunged toward Gaballufix—and found himself staring at the pulse in Gaballufix’s hand.

“Yes, yes, I see that you have some idea of what a pulse can do to a man at close range. You killed a man with a weapon just like this, didn’t you? In fact,” said Gaballufix, “it might have
been
this weapon, mightn’t it!”

Elemak looked at the pulse and recognized the wear marks on it, where it had been laid down on stone, where
it had been nicked and marked, where the color had been faded by the sunlight as it rested at his hip during countless hours of travel in the desert. “I lent that pulse to Mebbekew the day I got home from my last caravan,” he said stupidly.

“And Mebbekew lent it to me. I told him—speaking of fools—that I wanted it to surprise you with later, at a party, to honor you for drawing blood. I told him I was going to use your story to inspire my soldiers.” Gaballufix laughed. And laughed.

“That’s why you brought Meb in. To get my pulse.” But why? Elemak imagined his father lying there, dead, and then someone discovering Elemak’s pulse not far away, abandoned perhaps in his haste to flee. He imagined Gaballufix explaining to the city council, tears in his eyes. “This is where greed in the younger generation leads—my own half-brother, willing to murder his father in order to get his inheritance.”

“You’re right,” said Elemak quietly. “I
was
a fool.”

“You were and you are,” said Gaballufix. “You were seen in the city today—all over the city. My men tracked you through several neighborhoods. There are many witnesses—and it will be so delicious to see Rasa forced to testify against her beloved Volemak’s oldest boy. Because someone is going to die tonight, killed with this very pulse, which will be found near the body, and then everyone will know that it was Wetchik’s son who was the assassin, probably at his father’s orders. And the best part of it is, I can tell you this, and then I can let you know, I can put you out of the city
alive
and there’s still nothing you can do about it. If you start telling people about
my
plot to kill somebody—whoever I decide it should be—they’ll all assume that you were simply trying to cover up your own crime in advance. You
are
a fool, Elemak, just like your father. Even when you knew I
wasn’t afraid to kill to accomplish my purposes, you somehow thought that you and your family would be immune, that somehow I’d be more tender with you because the same weary old womb bore you and me during our nine months sucking life out of a placenta.”

Elemak had never seen such fury, such hatred, such
evil
in a human face, had never imagined it was possible. Yet there he stood, looking at Gabya’s glee in describing a crime he meant to commit. It frightened Elemak, but it also made him feel an insane kind of confidence. As if Gaballufix’s having revealed his true inner smallness made Elemak realize how much larger he was himself, after all.

“Who’s the fool, Gabya,” said Elemak. “Who’s the fool.”

“I think there’s no doubt of that now,” said Gaballufix.

“True enough,” said Elemak. “You’ll make it impossible for Father and me to return to the city, for a while at least, but the death of Roptat won’t open the road for you. Are you so stupid, really? Nobody will believe for a moment that Father would kill Roptat, or that I would either.”

“I’ll have the weapon!” said Gaballufix.

“The weapon, but no witness to the killing, just
your
story bruited about by
your
people. They aren’t so stupid that they can’t add one and one. Who stands to gain from Roptat’s death and Father’s exile? Only you, Gabya. This city will rise up in bloody rebellion against you. Your soldiers will die in the streets.”

“You overestimate the will of my feeble-hearted enemies,” said Gaballufix. But his voice didn’t sound so certain anymore, and the glee was gone.

“Your enemies aren’t feeble-hearted, just because they’re unwilling to kill in order to get their way. They
are
willing to kill to stop a man like
you
. A weak-brained,
jealous, spiteful, malicious little parasitic roach like you.”

“Do you want so much to die?”

“Yes, kill me here, Gabya. Hundreds of people know I’m here. Hundreds are waiting to hear what I tell them. Your whole plan stands revealed, and none of it will work. Because you were so stupid that you had to brag.”

Elemak’s words were all bluff, of course, but Gaballufix believed him. At least enough to make him pause. To make him wonder. Then Gabya smiled. “Elya, my brother, I’m proud of you.”

Elemak recognized surrender when he heard it. He said nothing in reply.

“You
are
my brother after all—the blood of Volemak didn’t weaken you after all. It may even have made you stronger.”

“Do you really think I’ll swallow your flattery
now
?”

“Of course not,” said Gaballufix. “Of course you’ll disregard it—but that doesn’t stop me from admiring you, does it? It just stops you from believing in my admiration! The loss is yours, dear Elya.”

“I came for the Index, Gaballufix,” said Elemak. “A simple thing. Give it to me, and I’m gone. Wetchik and his family will never bother you again, and you can play your little games until somebody puts a knife in your back just to stop that squealing noise you make whenever you think you’ve been especially clever.”

Gaballufix cocked his head to one side.

He’s going to give it to me, thought Elemak, triumphantly.

“No,” said Gaballufix. “I’d like to, but I can’t. The disappearance of the Index—that would be hard to explain to the clan council. A lot of trouble, that’s what it would cause, and why should I put myself to all that trouble just to get rid of Wetchik? After all, I’m already rid of him.”

Now, at last, Elemak was where he wanted to be: bargaining like a merchant. “What else would it take to make it worth your while?” asked Elemak.

“Make me an offer. Enough money that it’ll make up for all the extra effort I have to go through.”

“Give me the Index, and Father will release funds to you. Whatever you want.”

“I’m supposed to
wait
for the funds? Wait for
Wetchik
to pay me later for an Index I give you now? Oh—I get it—I see what’s happening!” Gaballufix laughed in derision. “You can’t give me money
now
because you don’t have any. Wetchik still hasn’t released any of his fortune to you! He sent you on this errand and he didn’t even give you access to his money!”

It
was
humiliating. Father should have realized that in dealing with Gaballufix it would eventually come down to money; he should have given him password that would have let him access the Wetchik family funds. Rashgallivak, the steward, had more control over the Wetchik fortune than Elemak did. He was filled with fury and resentment against his father for putting him in such a position of weakness. The stupid short-sighted old man, always tripping over his own feet when it came to business!

“Tell me, Elya,” said Gaballufix, interrupting his own laughter. “If your own father doesn’t trust you with his money, why should I trust you with the Index?”

With that, Gaballufix reached under his table and apparently triggered some kind of switch, for three doors opened at once and identical-looking soldiers burst into the room. They took hold of Elemak and roughly thrust him out into the hall, then out the front door.