In Denebeim’s household there were seven sons, six daughters, and, for now, a young wife--daughter of the shareholder who farmed the Fontein hectares nearest the Ice. Beltram, now in his late fifties, had buried four wives. Childbearing on the Planetia was a life-devouring business. It sometimes seemed to Beltram Denebeim that human beings, having come uninvited to Planet Voerster, were becoming as necrogenic as the native fauna.
Among Planetians, Beltram would have been thought a sentimentalist. He had loved several of his sturdy, vastly lunged and furry wives. He was fond of his children, and he held a special place in his oversized heart for his son, Orrin. One was expected to accept the fact that life was hard and risky on the Planetia, and Beltram did accept it.
But as each hour brought the dawn nearer and no sign of Orrin’s boat could be seen, Denebeim found himself praying to his austere New Lutheran saints--Matthew, Luke, Armstrong, and Bol-Derek--for some sign of his son’s safe return from the sea.
The sign came.
It appeared low in the western sky, a streak of blue-white fire rising from the tumbled clouds hugging the Shieldwall. It soared straight overhead, lighting the barren landscape of The Claw’s coastline in a supernatural light the color of the electric bolts that fell from the sky during thunderstorms.
Beltram Denebeim dropped his telescope and stared, open-mouthed, at the sky. The object passed high overhead, soon followed by a rolling crash of deep thunder. It continued to climb steeply out over the sea to the southeast.
The Planetian sank to his knees. He was not a religious man, but he knew that he had experienced an epiphany. He watched, filled with wonder, as the fiery manifestation dwindled and finally faded beyond the southeastern horizon.
And when he fumbled for his telescope, found it, and leveled it once again at the sea, he was in no way surprised to see, bright in the starlight, the sail of his son Orrin’s small boat returning home.
The last thing in all the world Ian Voerster wanted at the very moment of armed departure for Einsamberg was an unannounced appearance of an investigative committee of the Deliberative Assembly, led by Ulf Walvis, Kraalheer of Windhoek, and one of the most pompous and stupid legislators ever to sit in the Kongresshalle.
Walvis, a corpulent septuagenarian of impeccable Boer stock, fancied himself a rival of Ian Voerster for the presidency. In fact, Mynheer Ulf was a frequently used cat’s-paw, a dodderer who was sent here and there primarily as an expression of the displeasure of the Deliberative Assembly.
When used in this way, the Kraalheer of Windhoek was given a portfolio containing a list of questions and demands-- none with acknowledged authorship--as a Bill of Particulars, which, if not answered suitably by the party under investigation, could then become a part of a Bill of Attainder in the extremely unlikely chance of such a bill being voted by the full Assembly.
In nearly two hundred years, no such disciplinary action had ever been taken against a Voerster. In the same two hundred years, bills had been presented to a number of Ian’s ancestors with blustering demands for answers or explanations of policies disliked by the members of the Assembly. There was no record of any of these demands ever having been met.
This knowledge of Voertrekker history caused the eight members of the investigative committee to defer to their senior member, Ulf Walvis. The committee members arrived at Voertrekkerhoem in the small hours of the morning. The eight members had decided that a more suitable time to interview the Voertrekker-Praesident would be midmorning. But Ulf Walvis, a man who was both conscientious and dull-witted, said (quite accurately) that the Voertrekker-Praesident was obviously about to depart for Einsamberg with a military force of the Wache, and that since it was this very expedition that the Assembly wished explained, he, Ulf of Windhoek, would interview Ian Voerster at once, and if necessary, alone.
It was indeed necessary. The other members of the committee (quite properly in their view) refused to be impolite to the Head of State and remained in their guest rooms at Voertrekkerhoem.
Ulf Walvis, dressed in full legislative regalia, marched out to the airship ground where the troops of the Wache were embarking on an Impala-class police cruiser. Once there, he cornered Ian Voerster and, to the Voertrekker-Praesident’s barely contained fury, began his litany of complaint.
“I regret the necessity, Voertrekker-Praesident, but I am empowered by the Committee of Investigation and Inquiry to question you--”
Voerster, interrupted in an exchange with a Wache officer he considered far more important than either Ulf Walvis or, for that matter, the entire Deliberative Assembly, looked up at Walvis with bloodshot, angry eyes.
“Walvis, what the hell do you think you are about? Can’t you see that I am busy here?” At the far side of the field a ground crew struggled to maintain control of the loading of the Impala-class airship. The winds were swirling around the stone buildings and across the field where the starcraft stood like rows of huge tombstones. Since the cargo had been unloaded and the odd cybernetic machines that did the work had withdrawn into the shuttles, no one at Voertrekkerhoem had ventured near them. The Voertrekkers feared the shuttles and the kaffirs ignored them. Ian had hoped that the first unpleasant hours of detention would have made Jean Marq amenable to using his advanced machines in what Ian Voerster called his “punitive expedition” to Einsamberg. But it appeared that Jean Marq had never once considered such a course of action. The Starman had, in fact, begun to act very strangely, dropping into sleepless trances at unexplained moments and looking at The Voerster’s preparations to regain authority over his wife and daughter with a bemused detachment.
Jean’s apparent indifference had enraged Ian Voerster. Who did the Starman imagine he was, not to fear the authority of the Voertrekker-Praesident of Planet Voerster?
This most recent disturbance, in the person of the fat and foolish Ulf Walvis, sent The Voerster into a near-ballistic arc of fury.
“Damn you and damn the Assembly,” The Voerster snapped angrily. “Can’t you see that I am busy?” Because he was developing a self-nurtured autocrat’s rage he added, “Get off this field now, while you still can, Mynheer Walvis.” A more prudent and less self-absorbed man than the Kraaiheer of Windhoek would have done as he was bid. After all, the mynheeren of Voerster had had years to become accustomed to Ian Voerster’s temper. But Ulf Walvis was not an alert man. He chose to argue with the Voertrekker-Praesident.
‘The Kongresshalle has heard disquieting stories about your dealings with the Planetians, Voerster.” Walvis stood with his ebray-gloved hands resting on his well-padded hips in an attitude of challenge. From a window on the guest floor of Voertrekkerhoem other members of the delegation from the capital watched and waited for the explosion that was sure to come.
“The Kraalheeren hear rumors,” Ulf Walvis declared, “that you have made a marriage contract for Broni Ehrengraf Voerster with Vikter Fontein. That you have promised the Highlanders what is not yours to promise--the First Landers’ kraal of Einsamberg, which is your wife’s.”
To landowners whose holdings were secured by similar or less secure titles, the promise to dishonor a First Landers’ Portion was tantamount to a declaration of class war against the gentry. “And the Assembly is also concerned about the reports that you have detained a Wired Starman, one Jean Marq, as hostage for the good behavior of others of his syndicate who landed at Einsamberg--”
Ian Voerster’s jowly face grew purple. The ever-restless members of the Deliberative Assembly, afraid to speak for themselves, had sent this fat caricature of a Voertrekker to prod and chastise and even correct the man who had ruled Voerster by decree for nineteen years, as had his ancestors for centuries before him.
Even now Ian Voerster would have been inclined to swallow his anger and sent Walvis off with vague promises. This was, after all, the method of dealing with the Assembly Ian had learned at his great-uncle’s knee. But the Kraalheer of Windhoek made one mistake too many. In his piping, fat man’s voice, he added the final indictment. “Our informants report that your wife has left you, Ian Voerster, and that she has taken the heiress--the Voertrekkersdatter--with her. This requires an appearance in the Kongresshalle and an explanation to the Council of Kraalheeren.”
Ian Voerster, eyes ablaze, drew back a gloved hand and struck old Walvis across the face. “How dare you speak like that to me?”
Ulf Walvis rocked backward and would have fallen, save for his bulk. Blood smeared his chin from cut lips. His pale Voertrekker’s eyes looked shocked and bewildered. He had spent his lifetime telling his betters things they did not wish to hear. Never had he been physically attacked for performing the duties assigned him by a committee of his peers. He tried to protest, but what came from his mouth was a gobbling babble of sounds. He could only think of the other members of his delegation back at the manor house. He wondered if they had seen him, shamed and mistreated.
“Ryndik!“
The chief of Ian Voerster’s bodyguard appeared instantly while the Wache captain to whom The Voerster had been speaking before Ulf Walvis’ untimely interruption swiftly and tactfully withdrew.
“Sah,” Trekkerpolizeioberst Ryndik reported.
“Take this clown and put him in the cells. Tell the warders that he is to remain there until we are out of here.”
He glared at the still-stupefied Walvis. “You need to learn manners, old man. And discretion. By all means,
discretion
.”
Walvis could only mop at his bleeding mouth with his expensively embroidered cuffs.
“And tell the Wache I am ready for the Starman now. Send him out. Under guard.”
“Sah!”
The Voerster watched the policeman march old Ulf across the airship field. Ian already felt some remorse, but the man had allowed himself too many liberties. His treatment would be a warning to all the members of the Deliberative Assembly, who appeared suddenly to believe that they had a right to interfere in the governance of both the Voerster family and the nation. Let them learn.
He busied himself with details of the embarkation. He knew it was a failing to insist on tending to each task himself. A Head of State should not need to control the scheduling of military games for his troops, supply of his police forces, regulation of supplies into and out of the townships, and now the embarkation of a punitive expedition against his wife.
Yet he had always done such things. He knew that many of the Kraalheeren said--behind his back--that he had the mind of a bookkeeper, and perhaps it was right, but he never felt secure unless he personally guided each and every detail of any project.
The trouble was that it took so much time. Departure for Einsamberg was already five-and-a-half hours overdue.
A detachment of the Wache appeared with the Starman Jean Marq.
“It would all have been easier if you had agreed to use your machines against my lawbreakers,” Ian Voerster said aggressively.
But Marq seemed oddly subdued and at peace. “I could not do that,
Monsieur le President
. It would be a violation of my syndic’s oath.”
“Well, your oath is going to get you an airship ride in irons, my fine Wired Starman. Be assured of that.”
Jean Marq made no reply. Instead he was looking at the sky to the west over Amity Bay. A bright star was rising swiftly, leaving behind it a trail of golden ionization.
“I do not know what it is you wanted to do with all this,” Jean Marq said, indicating the airship and the embarking troops. “But it is really too late,
Monsieur le President
. What will be will be.”
Ian Voerster looked at the sky. There was a bitter taste of anger in his throat. “I still have you, Mynheer Marq. I still have you.”
Duncan lay upon the deck, pinned by the four Gs of Amaya’s emergency liftoff. As the acceleration eased, he lifted his head. At the far end of the compartment he could see Amaya, Wired in and contained in her pilot’s pod. Beside her, in the open copilot’s pod, lay Eliana. He could only just make out above the bulge of G-absorbent gel. Her now-familiar velvet Voertrekker’s gown was dishevelled, the long skirt above her knees. It was the first time Duncan had seen the Voertrekkerschatz’s legs. The thought brought with it a wry amusement, when one considered the circumstances of the escape from Einsamberg.
In ordinary acceleration couches along the bulkheads of the compartment, the dim light of the radarscope and holo-center showed Broni, wide-eyed, obviously showing the effects of the takeoff. Very pale, silent, breath coming hard. Next to her Buele, also wide-eyed but far less silent. He was uttering strange and inarticulate cries that might have been signals of distress or pleasure. Duncan guessed the latter.
Next to Broni and the boy lay Black Clavius, relaxed in a Starman’s takeoff attitude, eyes closed, lips moving in some unknown invocation; and Osbertus Kloster, plainly terrified and disoriented by the pressure of forces on his body--forces that must seem as strange to him as any he had ever experienced in a long life downworld.
Duncan was impressed with Buele. The boy was far less handicapped than he appeared to be. He had assisted Duncan on the run across the meadow in the dark. He had got himself aboard the shuttle with a minimum of guidance from either Duncan or Anya Amaya, and he had made himself at home on one of the padded couches, as though he instinctively knew their purpose.
Duncan rose to his feet carefully. The G-load was diminishing, which meant that the sled was near to achieving orbit. Even as he considered it, the flight holograph shed its resonance and plasma symbols. He felt the twisting moment as the sled assumed orbital attitude, with the planet “overhead.”
Anya opened the sliding carapace and there was seen a vast and silvery Voerster, shining in the white light of Luyten. Sundazzle flashed from the tops of great cyclonic weather systems--the same systems that only a short time ago had been wetting the new grave of Han Soo in the valley of Einsamtal.