Beyond the Gate

Chapter 11

The Bock led Gallen over the hill and into a city market, on a wide street where canvas tarpaulins fixed to poles provided some shelter. Under the tarps, small, tan-colored men and women haggled with customers over the prices of exotic fruits and trays of fishes. The locals wore short colorful tunics that left their legs exposed. On their shoulders they wore hooded half capes made of soft, oiled leather.

The vendors’ stalls smelled strongly of curry, anise, saffron, vanilla, and pepper-salt and spices beyond number. The pair moved past brass potmakers, past coils of hemp, bags of wheat, down toward some docks where they had to pass human guards.

Forty ships had put into port, and the docks were awash with all types of cargo-bales of wool and cotton, silks and hemp. Crates filled with beans and furniture, ingots of brass and steel. The Bock explained that most of the people in the crowd were nonhumans, come to trade from far-off lands.

A batch of red-furred sailors in heavy leather armor were unloading a scow, singing a high nasal song. Gallen looked at them in wonder, feeling that something more was wrong with them than their fur, when he realized that they had no ears.

Among bales of cotton, a dark woman dressed in yellow silks sat upon a palanquin that was at the moment unattended. On a long metal chain she held a pitiable creature, an emaciated girl with greenish skin and sad eyes who squatted naked atop a coil of hemp. There were no other men about to bear the palanquin, and as Gallen looked at the woman, she squatted on her hands, and smiled at him. She moved in an odd manner, scratching her arm with her teeth in a way that was distinctly unlike anything he had seen before, and as she stared at him with glimmering eyes, the look of undisguised lust in her eyes frightened him, for Gallen understood immediately that she did not lust for his flesh, except to eat it.

“What is that?” Gallen asked in disgust, leaping back from the woman.

“That is a Herap,” the Bock answered. “Among her people, ten men are born for every female. Once she mates with a man, she dines on him, if she can.”

Gallen was truly dismayed by all of this, and soon the oddities he noticed among the locals-grotesquely enlarged chests, huge grasping toes, violet skin-all began to meld together in his mind, a seething collage of monstrosities.

A warm shower started, but despite the downpour, the people milled about freely, oblivious to such weather. If it had truly been the Bock’s determination to simplify parade Gallen through the streets, it could have taken Gallen back to Maggie then. But instead the Bock led him resolutely past the marketplace, down toward a district where the buildings began to close in, stone houses flanking the narrow streets, each house with its pillars and portico protruding out so far that they had to walk around them.

“Where are we going?” Gallen asked at last, wiping the rain from his face. “Consider for a moment,” the Bock answered, “but do not speak your guess.” And Gallen knew that they were going to see Ceravanne.

The Bock led Gallen down around the bay, and over a hill, farther up the coast. The city extended on for miles, stretching among the hills, and Gallen realized that they had been only at the very southern tip of it. The sky began to darken, and the streets emptied far too quickly, until few people walked the streets, and those who did glanced about furtively and would duck into alleyways when they saw Gallen and the Bock approaching.

“This part of the city isn’t safe,” Gallen said.

“If you wore weapons or more clothing, this would be a dangerous neighborhood,” the Bock answered. “But obviously you are carrying no money. A half-naked man and a Bock-no one would bother with us. Besides, are you not a killer?”

“A Lord Protector,” Gallen answered uncomfortably.

“A killer,” the Bock argued, a hint of distaste in his voice.

“And you disapprove?” Gallen asked.

“I am a Bock. We respect all life.”

“You must eat.”

“I have a mouth so that I may speak,” the Bock answered. “Beyond that, I take nourishment from the rain and the soil. I cannot comprehend killing. Life is precious-in all its forms. Unfortunately, not everyone agrees with me. Some peoples are esteemed as less than others. For example, in the wilderness of Babel, there are creatures called the Roamers. Their ancestors were humans, but the desire for enclosure was bred out of them, and they were given hair and great strength and stamina, so that they might thrive in the wilds without shelter. They wear no clothes, and many in Babel think of them as somehow less than human, animals. The Roamers do not have human rights-access to human technology and the human system of justice.”

“That doesn’t seem fair to me,” Gallen said. “Why, back home, every man can have his day in court.”

“But for many subspecies of human,” the Bock countered, “the human system of justice itself is unfair. It requires them to think and act like humans-something they cannot do. And so we cannot hold them to human laws.”

“But what if a nonhuman kills someone else?” Gallen said. “Certainly you can’t just allow that.”

“All beings are held accountable equally,” the Bock answered. “In such cases, our courts hire a champion to hunt down the offender, and slay it.”

And suddenly Gallen knew why he was here. “The Inhuman.…”

The Bock glanced at him sideways, the wide portion of his head swiveling. “Yes. Champions have been sent to Babel to hunt the Inhuman, but they never returned, and still its power spreads. That is why our leaders requested a Lord Protector from off-world, someone licensed to use weapons that we keep restricted here.”

“So you want me to hunt down and slay this Inhuman?” Gallen asked.

“I want nothing of the sort. Whether the lion or the jackal wins this conflict does not matter to me. It does not matter to the rocks and sky and water. I see little difference between the goals of the Inhuman and your goals, nor do I see any difference in your methods for gaining control. Ceravanne says that your people fight for freedom, but freedom is an illusion, so long as the light within you is encased in a body made of dust. You are all slaves to your animal desires-”

“And you’re not?” Gallen asked.

“I am not an animal,” the Bock said. “That is why the Tharrin … worship me.” Gallen caught his breath at this last bit of news, for he imagined the Tharrin to be the highest life-forms in the galaxy. It had never occurred to him that the Tharrin would look up to other beings, much less that they would so admire another species that they would worship it. For the past hour, Gallen had felt that the Bock had been trying to show him something, had been trying to get across a message that somehow wasn’t connecting. Now Gallen focused more attentively.

“Gallen, I desire that both sides find a path to peace, nothing more.” The Bock stopped in a narrow alley. A chill wind swept through the alley, and overhead several pigeons flapped about, trying to find the best roosting spot on the crumbling stone lip of a roof. Gallen could see over the edge of town, and the suns setting out over the ocean were shining on some near hills. He could see the front of the temple near where the Gate of the World opened, and near the temple’s huge doors, an enormous brass disk reflected the dying suns. Two giants in yellow robes began to beat the disk with great clubs, so that the gong flashed golden like the wings of a fiery bird, and the sound of it echoed over the town. There was silence for the moment. “Those giants are called Acradas. In many ways they are wise, but each night they try to call the suns back, fearing that unless their sun disk tolls, the suns will never return.” The Bock hesitated, and Gallen pitied such ignorant creatures. “You and I look at the Acradas, and we think them strange. As you are to Acradas, I am to you. My thoughts are incomprehensible to you, and you and the Inhuman are equally alien to me. But we-each of us-are held prisoner by our own bodies. We sense the world in our own way, and we act toward it in ways that our mind allows. No man can truly be comprehended by another. Here on our world, in the City of Life, our people design new forms of humanity to inhabit other worlds. They have created over five thousand subspecies of human. Many of them have far-reaching enhancements that cannot be detected by eye alone, and with others, apparently major enhancements are merely cosmetic. For some subspecies, their paths of thought so differ from those of mankind that they cannot be held accountable to the laws that govern life here in the human lands. Still, their lives are precious to them. They cannot help what they are, and they cannot change it. They are not capable of being human, but you, Gallen O’Day, I hope will look upon them with empathy and understanding.”

“You want me to judge the Inhuman?” Gallen asked.

The Bock whispered, “Many people have been absorbed by the mind of the Inhuman. Few of the people who have become Inhuman did so of their own free will. For each Inhuman that you meet, you will have to decide whether to slay it or let it live.” The Bock sighed, and its mouth opened and its eyes half closed.

For a moment, it gave an expression of such profound sadness that Gallen feared it would break into tears. “And yet, Gallen, I suspect that you will have no chance to reason with or prevail against this … thing. The Inhuman is powerful, and if the rumors we hear are true, it controls hundreds of thousands of beings.…” The Bock glanced up, then whispered, “See, there is one of its scouts now! They come to the city every night!”

Gallen looked skyward, and from the clouds above a dark form swooped, a wriggling tatter of night that suddenly resolved into a creature flapping on batlike wings. As Gallen watched, he almost imagined it to be an enormous bat. And suddenly he knew why the streets here cleared at dusk. The servants of the Inhuman owned the night.

“Quickly now,” the Bock said. “We must get indoors.” Gallen had a sudden cold fear, and he wondered if Maggie and Orick were all right. He would need to get back to them soon. Gallen stopped, unwilling to go any farther with this strange creature. The Bock turned and looked at him expectantly, waiting for Gallen to follow. “Wait a minute,” Gallen said. “What of Maggie and Orick? Shouldn’t we go back for them?”

“Soon, soon,” the Bock promised. “All in time.”

And Gallen wondered. He was a stranger to this world, still unsure of its dangers. The Bock knew more than he did. Perhaps the fact that the Inhuman was sending scouts to the city at night did not mean that Maggie was in danger-but Gallen had seen the fear in the eyes of the locals as they hurried off the streets.

“I’ll go no farther with you,” Gallen said.

“Please, hurry,” the Bock said. “It is not much farther-a moment more.”

Gallen hesitated, greatly tom. But Maggie had Orick to guard her, and Gallen suspected that another moment would make little difference. Reluctantly, he followed the Bock.

The Bock led Gallen to the side entrance of a building, and they stepped under the portico and hurried down a maze of dark hallways until Gallen was completely turned around. Then the Bock stopped and whispered a name at a door that looked like all the others. “Ceravanne.”

Gallen heard a bolt sliding, then the door opened, and behind it stood a young woman wrapped in a dark cloak that hid most of her face. Yet Gallen could see the precisely sculpted cheekbones and brow that marked her kind. He found himself wishing that she would speak, so that he might hear her voice. Her dark eyes were haunted, and she looked at Gallen hopefully for a second, then turned and led the way into a dusty store room filled with barrels and crates, moving with a delicate grace that could only belong to a Tharrin.

Gallen entered the room behind the Bock, feeling extremely ill at ease. As he stepped through the doorway, the door closed a little and a large man moved in behind Gallen, placing a sword at the side of his neck. “Far enough,” the man said, putting just enough weight on the blade to force Gallen to step sideways and back. “Face the wall.”

Gallen stood against the wall, bridling at the thought. He’d come here unarmed, without so much as a knife or his mantle. His legs were shaking, and Gallen forced himself to breathe deeply, hold down his anger. The guard kept the sword to the back of his neck, then ran one hand through Gallen’s long hair, checking carefully around the base of his neck. “He’s clean, milady,” the guard said. “No weapons, and no scars near the neck.”

“The Lord Protector, Gallen O’Day, did not come alone,” the Bock told Ceravanne. “He brought a woman and a bear. I left them behind with the weapons, as ordered.”

The guard stepped back, and Gallen glanced at the Bock, realizing that this seemingly innocuous creature had a duplicitous streak to it. “You tricked me,” Gallen said.

“Ceravanne asked me to bring you to her alone, stripped of weapons,” the Bock answered. “But I asked you to come so for my own reasons.”

So the Bock and Lady Ceravanne worked at cross-purposes, and Gallen realized that he might be working at cross-purposes to them both. The Bock wanted the Inhuman left alone. Ceravanne perhaps sought only to stop its encroachments. And without knowing anything about the Inhuman, Gallen had halfway decided to kill it.

Ceravanne was about to speak, but she stopped, as if a sudden thought had occurred to her. “Bock, isn’t it getting dark out?”

“It is late,” the Bock agreed.

“But-Gallen’s friends, where did you leave them?”

“In the field, at the opening to the gate.”

Ceravanne frowned, plainly worried. “Bock, we can’t leave them for the night-the Inhumans…!”

“I will go get them,” the Bock said.

Ceravanne said, “Can you retrieve them before full nightfall?”

“If I hurry across the fields, over the hill!”

“Rougaire, you go with him,” Ceravanne said.

The guard, a giant with a bulbous red nose and weathered features, put one hand on his sword and said, “Yes, milady.”

“Should I go, too?” Gallen asked.

Ceravanne frowned. “No,” she said after a moment. “I think not. I still need a guard. And if your friends stayed put, the Bock and Rougaire should reach them soon enough. Four people traveling together in the early evening are not in great danger-especially not when Rougaire is among them.”

The giant Rougaire took a heavy robe from atop a nearby crate and put it on, then strapped his swords to his back. Gallen studied the man’s movements. He was all strength and no grace. When he was ready, the giant handed Gallen one of his swords, a weapon that seemed just a bit too long and heavy for convenient use.

“For you, sir,” Rougaire said, bowing deeply.

“I’d rather have one of your daggers,” Gallen said. The giant frowned a bit at Gallen’s choice, then took one of his daggers from its sheath at his knee and handed it to Gallen. It was large enough for Gallen to use as a short sword. Gallen just held it, for he’d left his belt with Maggie and had nowhere to put the weapon.

“Thank you, Rougaire,” the Lady Ceravanne said to the guard. “Go quickly!” The guard bowed to her, then hurried out in company with the Bock. Gallen bolted the door behind them.

Ceravanne studied Gallen, and the haunted look did not leave her eyes. She appeared to be a child of thirteen or fourteen, but she held herself with a dignity, a wisdom, far beyond her years. Her platinum hair cascaded in waves down over her shoulders, and she watched him from green eyes, paler than any eyes he’d ever seen or imagined. She wore a delicate white dress with white birds embroidered upon it, and she looked like something not quite human, like a fragile fairy bride in a dark glen. But there was the pain in her eyes, and Gallen wondered idly how many cloned bodies she had worn out.

“I’m sorry for asking the Bock to bring you stripped and alone,” she said. “I asked him to bring you alone because curious children sometimes follow the Bock, and I didn’t want them tagging along. The Bock … is very wise in his way, but he does not think on our level. He often takes the things we say too literally, and he does not comprehend the import of our struggle. He meant no harm, and I hope that no harm will come of it.”

“My friend Orick is handy in a fight,” Gallen said, trying to put her at ease, still uneasy himself. “I suspect they’ll be all right.”

“I am not worried that they will be injured or killed,” Ceravanne said. “I’m worried that they will be infected by the Inhuman.”

“Infected?”

“The Inhuman sends agents-small creatures-to burrow into their victims from the back of the neck, and then the creature infects its host with the Inhuman’s propaganda, downloading information into the victim’s brain. Those who have recently been infected will bear a scar at the base of the neck.”

Ceravanne went to a large barrel, used a match to light a single candle, then set it on the barrel. She sat down cross-legged at the base of it, and motes of dust rose up, floated in the light.

“I asked the rebellion to send someone I could trust. Can I trust you?” she asked.

Gallen stared into the child’s eyes, and his heart felt as if it would melt. He had forgotten how powerful the scent of a Tharrin woman could be, had forgotten how the pheromones she exuded could tug at his sanity. One look at her frail, perfect figure, and he wanted only to fall to his knees, pledge his fealty. And because she was Tharrin, because she was bred to rule in kindness, he could see no reason not to do so. Yet Gallen remembered the deadly rose in its glass last night, someone warning him against trusting the beautiful Tharrin? He stood aloof from her. “Of course you can trust me.”

“You are new to our world,” Ceravanne said. “I forget my manners. Is there anything you need? Food, drink?”

“No,” Gallen said.

“I suppose you have questions?”

“Your friend, the Bock-he said that you Tharrin worship him. Is this true?”

“Worship?” The question seemed to make her nervous. She shook her head and looked away a bit guiltily. “I’m afraid he does not understand all of the nuances of our language. I revere him, certainly. I respect him, seek to emulate him. He is my teacher, and I love him as a friend.…Perhaps ‘worship’ is close to the right word.” She looked at him squarely. “I do not worship him any more than you worship the Tharrin, I suspect. Do you worship the Tharrin?”

Gallen puzzled at the question. In many ways, he almost did. He found that when he was in their presence, he could not help but serve them faithfully. He admired them. He had loved the Lady Everynne. Still … “No,” Gallen said. “I do not trust them completely. I have learned that despite all appearances, we are not the same species.”

Ceravanne smiled wryly at that. “In some ways, I trust the Bock completely. He is a man of peace, who can do no harm. But it seems that I cannot trust him to fetch a Lord Protector to me, without botching the job.”

Gallen changed the subject. “Why does the Inhuman want you?”

“I’m Tharrin,” Ceravanne answered. “And therefore am born to lead. The Inhuman may want me as a leader.”

“I am surprised,” Gallen admitted. “With the dronon gone from this world, I would have thought you would be a Lord Judge, wearing a mantle.”

“No,” Ceravanne said. “The human lords in the City of Life act as judges on this world, not me. I act as a counselor to them only-should they seek my counsel. I have not held much power for the past several centuries. Still, I am the last of the Tharrin here, and so the Inhuman seeks to control me.

“Beyond that, what I can tell you about the Inhuman is mostly guesses.

“We began to hear rumors of it three years ago. At first it was only one or two odd reports, borne from the interior of Babel by nonhumans who came with wild tales. The lands there are very rugged and backward, and we imagined that it was only some new religion. But when our leaders sought to send scouts to the area, the dronon opposed us. Among the Rebellion, there was some talk of sending our own scouts in secret, but we erred-we ignored the rumors for the moment, and concentrated instead on fighting the dronon.

“So the Inhuman seemed to grow slowly, until last year. Among the peoples of Babel, there is a race called the Tekkar, a brilliant people, engineered to live on a brutal world so hot that men can only safely move about at night. They have purple eyes that see in the dark, and they are themselves stealthy and dark. Within weeks, all the tribes of Tekkar were converted, and then they began to attack their neighbors by night, converting those they could, slaying those who opposed them.”

Gallen said slowly, “The Bock showed me some of the peoples who live here, and he warned that some were more powerful, more vicious than humans. Yet I wonder: the Tharrin are peaceful people-why would you create such beings?”

“Once again, you overestimate my influence,” Ceravanne said. “The human lords in the City of Life choose which races to create, which attributes are needed for those who will inhabit other worlds. Some of the beings they’ve created were designed before the Tharrin were born. Others I see as abominations that should never have been formed. Still, I have long sought to maintain peace between our various races.”

“You were telling me about the Inhuman?” Gallen said.

“Yes. It was about a year ago that the Inhuman sent its first scouts to the City of Life, where I had been in hiding from the dronon for many years. The agents of the Inhuman tried to abduct me, but I resisted to the death, and my faithful followers downloaded my memories into a new clone.

“Then sailing ships began arriving from Babel, ships filled with refugees, and they warned us of the darkness growing in the land of Moree. Only then did we begin to recognize the true size of the danger, but we could not mount an attack against the Inhuman. The dronon still ruled here, and they refused our pleas. At first, we thought they were only refusing to take sides in a local squabble, so we sent out scouts then, in secret. Even I went with that first scouting party, but most of our people were killed, and those who survived returned as Inhuman converts who betrayed the Rebellion by pointing out our operatives. Some small bands of our people went to war secretly then, but they were no match for the Inhuman.

“Then three months ago it became apparent that the dronon were openly siding with the Inhuman. They put a marching hive city in each of our ports so that we could not mount an offensive. We could not defeat the dronon’s aircraft and walking fortresses with spears and swords.

“And so we began to lose hope. We thought we would all be consumed-until a few days ago, when the dronon left our worlds. And suddenly our hope is reborn!”

“And what is the Inhuman’s cause?” Gallen asked.

“It was created for the purpose of convincing mankind that our species can coexist peacefully-as subjects within the dronon Empire.”

“So the dronon created the Inhuman?”

Ceravanne frowned. “Not exactly. It is beyond their technology-in some ways, it is beyond ours. Here on Tremonthin, we have adopted a simple way of life. Nearly all technology is proscribed, except that which is used in the service of extending life. In the City of Life we download memories into clones, perform our great work of adapting mankind to fit within alien ecosystems. Because it is our sole technological export, our life-enhancing technologies are among the best in the galaxy. The dronon incorporated our technologies into the Inhuman. Some of our scientists aided them. We found the perpetrators, and those who aided them willingly have already been dealt with. The rest are working to undo the damage.”

“You say that the dronon helped create the Inhuman,” Gallen said. “What is the Inhuman?”

“The dronon saw that with the thousands of subspecies of mankind living on this world, it was the perfect place to experiment, learn which breeds might most easily integrate into their society.

“So they made an artificial intelligence that stores the memories of dronon technicians, along with those of nonhumans from our southern continent.

“And this artificial intelligence is struggling to infect our people with a new world view-a complex web of memories and beliefs and lies that lead those infected to convert to the doctrines of the Inhuman,” Ceravanne sighed. “We couldn’t fight such sophisticated weaponry.”

“Then why don’t you get better weapons?” Gallen blurted out. “Bring in forces from off-world.”

Ceravanne looked pointedly at Gallen. “Our world is distant from others. Even with the fastest ships-and such ships are on their way-it will take months for help to arrive. Even then, it will be hard to mount an attack on Babel. It was created as a refuge for nonhumans, and many of the species there fear us. If we attacked in force, they would see it as an invasion and would seek to turn us away. So even those we count as allies could turn against us. But more importantly, many of the nonhumans in Babel are genetically upgraded. They are stronger and faster than us, tougher, and often more cunning. We could not defeat them on their own ground. We can hardly hope to repel an invasion.”

“So you want me to sneak into the southlands and destroy this Inhuman, this machine?” Gallen asked. Ceravanne studied him a moment, then looked down at her feet. Her jaw trembled, and an expression of utter hopelessness crossed her face. “Oh, Gallen, I wish that were all I was asking of you.…”

Gallen went to her, knelt and put his hand on her shoulder, trying to comfort her. She looked up, reached up with one hand and stroked his cheek, then kissed him softly.

For one long moment, he allowed it-reveling in the sweet, intense taste of her lips-then pulled back sharply, as if he’d been struck. He wiped her kiss from his mouth with the back of his arm, yet the scent of her pheromones lingered, and he had to remind himself that as a Tharrin she was made so that he would love her. “I, I-” He fumbled for an explanation. “I’m married.”

“I need you!” Ceravanne said fiercely. “I need you to give yourself to me completely. Gallen-I don’t know everything about the Inhuman, but I believe that it is more dangerous than you or I can imagine. It isn’t just a machine, it is a technology that has fused the minds of millions of beings-and they will oppose you. It is not just the machine, it is the talents and wisdom and hopes of all those people. I can’t tell you what I think I must ask you to do for me! But I need you to trust me. If my guess is correct, it will be harder than anything you can imagine. I need you!”

Gallen studied her face. It was obvious that she planned to face this challenge with him, that she did not want to reveal her part in this fight. It annoyed him that she would hold her plans so secret, but looking into her eyes, he suddenly realized that he trusted her. “It seems that I do trust the Tharrin completely,” Gallen said. “Or at least I trust you. I’ll do whatever you ask-but don’t ask me to give you my heart.”

“I need that most of all!” Ceravanne whispered fiercely. “I need a Lord Protector to serve me wholly. Listen: in Moree there is a leader, a very powerful person that the servants of the Inhuman call ‘the Harvester.’”

That name struck a chord in Gallen, and he found his heart pounding. He was sure he’d never heard of this Harvester-yet he suddenly remembered something, a bit of information that only his mantle could have planted in his memory.

“Are you sure it’s human?” Gallen asked. “A thousand years ago, on a planet from the Chenowi system, a few hundred machines were built, machines called the Harvesters. They are nanotech devices which carry downloaded human memories. They can assume dozens of forms, change colors. They were designed to be the ultimate assassins. Over the centuries, most of them have been destroyed. But on a low-tech world like this, a Harvester would be almost invulnerable. It’s possible that one survives here.”

This bit of news seemed to disconcert Ceravanne. “I-never considered such a possibility,” she said.

“I’ll have to kill it,” Gallen said, almost certain that this Harvester was more than a mere person. Ceravanne looked up at him, startled, and there was resignation in her eyes. Though she was a Tharrin, and could never bring herself to harm another, she understood the need for killing at times. Still, she seemed tormented. “I hope it does not come to that,” Ceravanne whispered, and Gallen wondered at her naïveté. “But if it does, it won’t be easy. At the very least, I suspect that you will bear scars from this-scars on your soul, scars that you will abhor. I … am loath to ask this of you.”

“I’ve killed before,” Gallen said calmly, wondering what Ceravanne knew of this Harvester, and even as he said it, he remembered the three men back home, the empty-headed oafs who had forced his hand by testifying against him. He still felt marred by those killings, stained.

* * *