Use of Weapons (31 page)

He
was hit too, though he didn't know by what at the time.

The
attack on the house was beaten off. Darckense lived. She almost died, from loss
of blood, and shock; but she lived. The best surgeons in the land fought to
rebuild her pelvis, shattered into a dozen major pieces and a hundred
splinters by the impact of the round.

Bits
of bone had travelled her body; they found fragments in her legs, in one arm,
in her internal organs, even a piece in her chin. The army surgeons were fairly
used to dealing with that sort of injury, and they had the time (because the
war hadn't yet started then) and the incentive (for her father was a very
important man) to put her back together as best they could. Still, she would
walk awkwardly until she stopped growing, at least.

One
of the bone shards travelled further than her own body; it entered his. Just
above the heart.

The
army surgeons said it would be too dangerous to operate. In time, they said,
his body would reject the fragment of bone.

But
it never did.

He
started to crawl round the pool again.

Caldera!
That was the word, the name.

(Such
signals were important, and he'd found the one he'd been looking for.)

Victory,
he said to himself, as he hauled himself round, scattering a last few of the
bird-droppings out of his way, and apologising to the insects. Everything was
going to be just fine, he decided. He knew that, now, and knew that in the end
you always won, and that even when you lost, you never knew, and there was only
one fight, and he was at the centre of the whole ridiculous thing any way, and
Caldera was the word, and Zakalwe was the word, and Staberinde was the word,
and -

They
came for him; they came down with a big beautiful ship, and they took him up
and away and they made him all better again...

'They
never learn,' the sky sighed, quite distinctly.

'Fuck
you,' he said.

It
was years later that Cheradenine - returned from the military academy and
looking for Darckense, and sent in that direction by a monosyllabic gardener -
walked up the soft carpet of leaves to the door of the little summerhouse.

He
heard a scream from inside. Darckense.

He
dashed up the steps, drawing his pistol, and kicked the door open.

Darckense's
startled face twisted over her shoulder, regarding him. Her hands were still
clasped round Elethiomel's neck. Elethiomel sat, trousers round his ankles,
hands on Darckense's naked hips under her bunched-up dress, and looked calmly
at him.

Elethiomel
was sitting on the little chair that Livueta had made in her carpentry class,
long ago.

'Hi
there, old chap,' he said to the young man holding the pistol.

Cheradenine
looked into Elethiomel's eyes for a moment, then turned away, holstering the
pistol and buttoning the holster and walking out, closing the door behind him.

Behind
him he heard Darckense crying, and Elethiomel laughing.

The
island in the centre of the caldera became quiet again. Some birds flew back to
it.

The
island had changed, thanks to the man. Scraped in a circle all round the
central depression of the islet, drawn in a pathway of black bird droppings
cleared away from the pale rock, and with the appropriate tail of just the
right length leading off to one side (its other end pointing at the rock, which
was the central dot), the island seemed to have a letter or simple pictogram
printed on it, white on black.

It
was the local signal for 'Help me!', and you would only have seen it from an
aircraft, or from space.

A
few years after the scene in the summerhouse, one night while the forests
burned and the distant artillery thundered, a young army major jumped up onto
one of the tanks under his command, and ordered the driver to take the machine
through the woods, following a path which wound between the old trees.

They
left behind the shell of the recaptured mansion and the glowing red fires which
lit its once grand interior (the fires reflected on the waters of an ornamental
lake, by the wreckage of a demolished boat made of stone).

The
tank ripped through the woods, demolishing small trees and little bridges over
streams.

He
saw the clearing with the summerhouse through the trees; it was lit by a
flickering white light, as though by God.

They
got to the clearing; a star-shell had fallen into the trees above, its
parachute entangled in the branches. It sizzled and sputtered and shed a pure,
sharp, extreme light all over the clearing.

Inside
the summerhouse, the little wooden chair was quite visible. The tank's gun was
pointing straight at the small building.

'Sir?'
the tank commander said, peering worriedly from the hatch beneath.

Major
Zakalwe looked down at him.

'Fire,'
he said.

Eight

The
first snow of the year settled over the upper slopes of the cleft city; it
floated out of the grey-brown sky and fitted itself over the streets and the
buildings like a sheet thrown over a corpse.

He
dined alone at a large table. The screen he had wheeled into the middle of the
brightly lit room flickered with the images of released prisoners from some
other planet. The balcony doors were lying open, and through them drifted small
examples of the falling snow. The rich carpet of the room was frosted white
where the snow had settled, and stained dark further in where the heat of the
room had melted the crystals back into water again. Outside, the city was a
mass of half-unseen grey shapes. Ordered lights ran in lines and curls, dimmed
by distance and passing flurries.

Darkness
came like a black flag waved over the canyon, drawing back the greyness from
the shores of the city, then pushing forward the individual specks of street
and building lights as though in recompense.

The
silent screen and silent snow conspired; light flung a path into the silent
chaos of the fall beyond the window. He got up and closed the doors, the
shutters and the curtains.

The
next day was bright and clear, and the city could be seen sharply as far as the
canyon's broad curve would allow; buildings and lines of roads and aqueducts
stood out as though freshly drawn, gleaming like new paint, while cold, keen
sunlight rubbed a shine into the dullest grey stone. The snow lay over the top
half of the city; below, where the temperature stayed more level, the snow had
fallen as rain. There too the precise new day was displayed; he looked down
from the car and studied the sight. Every detail delighted him; he counted
arches and cars and traced the lines of water and road and flue and track
through all their convolutions and hidings; he inspected every flash of
reflected sunlight, squinted at every dot of wheeling bird and noted every
broken window, through the very dark glasses.

The
car was the longest and sleekest of all those he'd bought or hired; it was an
eight seater with a huge inefficient rotary engine driving both rear axles, and
he had its collapsible slatted hood down. He sat in the back and enjoyed the
feel of the cold air on his face.

The
terminal earring beeped. 'Zakalwe?'

'Yes,
Diziet?' he said. Talking quietly, he didn't think the driver would hear him
over the wind-roar. He raised the screen between them anyway.

'Hello.
Good. Very slight time delay from here, but not much. How's it going?'

'Nothing
yet. I'm called Staberinde and I'm causing a fuss. I own Staberinde Airlines,
there's a Staberinde Street, a Staberinde Store, a Staberinde Railway,
Staberinde Local Broadcasts... there's even a cruise liner called the
Staberinde. I've spent money like hydrogen, established within a week a
business empire most people would take a lifetime to set up, and I'm instantly
one of the most talked-about people on the planet, maybe in the Cluster...'

'Yes.
But, Cher...'

'Had
to take a service tunnel and leave the hotel by an annexe this morning; the
courtyard's crammed with press.' He glanced over his shoulder. 'I'm amazed we
really seem to have shaken the hounds off.'

'Yes,
Che...'

'Dammit,
I'm probably putting the war off all by myself just by being this crazy; people
would rather see what I'm going to squander my money on next than fight.'

'Zakalwe;
Zakalwe,' Sma said. 'Fine; great. But what is all this supposed to
do
?'

He
sighed, looked out at the derelict buildings speeding by to one side, not far
under the rimrock. 'It's supposed to get the name Staberinde into the media, so
that even a recluse studying ancient documents will get to hear the name.'

'...
And?'

'...
And there was something we did in the war, Beychae and I; a particular
stratagem. We called it the Staberinde strategy. But only between ourselves.
Strictly
between ourselves; it only
meant anything to Beychae because I explained about its... origin. If he hears
that word he
must
wonder what's going
on.'

'Sounds
like a great theory, Cheradenine, but it hasn't actually
worked
, has it?'

'No.'
He sighed, then frowned. 'There is media input to this place he's in, isn't
there? You're sure he's not just a prisoner?'

'There
is network access, but not directly. They've got it well screened; even we
can't see exactly what's going on. And we are certain he's not a prisoner.'

He
thought for a moment. 'How's the pre-war situation?'

'Well,
the full-scale still looks inevitable, but the likely lead time's increased by
a couple of days, to eight-to-ten, after a viable trigger-event. So... so far,
so good, to be optimistic.'

'Hmm.'
He rubbed his chin, watching the frozen waters of an aqueduct slide past, fifty
metres beneath the turnpike. 'Well,' he said. 'I'm on my way now to the
university; breakfast with the Dean. I'm setting up the Staberinde Scholarship
and the Staberinde Fellowship and the Staberinde... Chair,' he grimaced. 'And
maybe even the Staberinde College. Perhaps I should mention these stupendously
important wax tablets to the man as well.'

'Yes,
good idea,' Sma said, after a short pause.

'Okay.
I don't suppose they have any bearing on what Beychae's got his nose buried in,
have they?'

'No,'
Sma said. 'But they'd certainly be stored in the same place he's working; I
guess you could reasonably ask to inspect their security arrangements down
there, or just want to see where they'd be kept.'

'All
right. I'll mention the tablets.'

'Check
the guy hasn't got a weak heart, first.'

'Yeah,
Diziet.'

'One
other thing. That couple you asked us about; the ones that came to your street
party.'

'Yeah.'

'They're
Governance; that's the term they use for major local stockholders who tell the
corporate chiefs...'

'Yes,
Diziet, I remember the term.'

'Well,
these two are Solotol's, and what they say goes; the Chief Execs will almost
certainly do exactly as they suggest as far as Beychae is concerned, and that
means the official government will, too. They are also, of course, effectively
above the law. Don't mess with them, Charadenine.'

'Me?'
he said innocently, smiling to the cold, dry wind.

'Yes,
you. That's all from this end. Have a nice breakfast.'

'Bye,'
he said. The city slid past; the car's tyres made hissing, tearing noises on
the dark-surfaced turnpike. He turned up the heating in the footwell.

This
was a quiet part of the under-cliff road. The driver slowed for a sign and some
flashing lights ahead, then almost skidded at the sudden diversion sign and
emergency road markings that turned them off the road, over a ramp and down
onto a long concrete channel with sheer walls.

They
came to a steep rise with only sky visible beyond; the red lines indicating the
diversion led over the summit. The driver slowed, then shrugged and gunned the
engine. The hump of concrete raised the nose of the big car, hiding what was on
the far side.