Neq the Sword (18 page)

"Suppose you had stayed there?" Tyl asked.

"Why should I be different? I was only eight when I left, but already--" She stopped.

Tyl didn't speak, but after a while she felt compelled to explain. "One of the men--there's no age limit, you know. He liked them young, I suppose, and there weren't many girls anyway. But I wasn't ready. So I hit him with the sticks. That was all. I never told Sol--there would have been trouble."

There certainly would have been! Neq remembered something she had cried in the flower-forest, when the visions were strong. A threat to some attacking man.

"But if you had been older--" Tyl said.

"I would have gone with him, I guess. That's the way it is, in Helicon. Preference has nothing to do with it."

"But when you married Var--would you have returned to the mountain then?"

"That was where we were going!" Then she had to explain again. "Var would have understood. I would have kept his bracelet."

But she shared some of Var's naivete, for she still didn't comprehend where Tyl was leading her.

Neq's turn as subject, then, in similar fashion. Day by day, as they marched and fought and slept. He didn't want to cooperate, but Tyl was too clever for him, phrasing questions he had to answer openly or by default. Gradually the outline of Neq's service in the empire came out, and his extreme proficiency with the sword, and the code by which he had lived. Yes, he had killed many times as a subtribe leader, but never outside the circle and never without reason. Much of it had been done at Sol's direction; none on order of the Weaponless, who had not tried to expand the empire.

Vara remained grim, not liking this seeming alignment of character.

Then Tyl came at Neq's post-empire activity. "Why did you seek the crazies?"

"The empire was falling apart, and so was the nomad society, and outlaws were ravaging the hostels. There was no food, no supplies, no good weapons. I tried to learn why the crazies had retreated."

"Why had they retreated?"

"They depended on supplies from Helicon, and their trucks weren't getting through. So I said I'd take a look."

Then the description of what he had found at the mountain. Vara's impassivity crumbled; tears streamed down her cheeks. "I knew it was gone," she cried. "My two fathers did it, and Var and I helped. But we didn't know it was that awful...."

Thus Tyl had somehow cast Neq as the upholder of civilized values, while Sol and the Weaponless and even Var were its destroyers. What a turnabout for Vara's assumptions!

They marched a few more days. Then Tyl resumed. "Did you go alone to Helicon?"

Neq would not answer, for the memories remained raw despite the years and he did not want this part of it discussed.

Surprisingly, it was Vara who pursued the questioning now. "You married a crazy! I remember, you admitted it. Did she go with you?"

Still Neq was silent. But Tyl answered. "Yes."

"Who was she? Why did she go?" Vara demanded.

"She was called Miss Smith," Tyl said. "She was secretary to Doctor Jones, the crazy chief. She went to show the way, and to write a report. They drove in a crazy truck, all the way across America. That's the Ancient name for the crazy demesnes--America."

"I know," she said shortly. And another day: "Was she fair?"

"She was," Tyl said. "Fair as only the civilized are fair."

"I'm fair!"

"Perhaps you too are civilized."

She winced at the implications. "Literate?"

"Of course." Few nomads could read, but most crazies had the ability. Vara herself was literate, but neither Tyl nor Neq.

Another day: "Was she a--a real woman?"

"She turned down the Weaponless, because he wouldn't stay with the crazies."

Neq winced this time. Neqa had put it another way.

"The Weaponless was my father!" Vara flared. Then: "My natural one. Not my real one."

"Nevertheless."

"And she loved Neq?" she demanded distastefully.

"What do you think?" Tyl asked in return, with a hint of impatience.

Another day: "How could a literate, civilized woman love _him_?"

"She must have known something we do not," Tyl said with gentle irony.

Finally: "How did she die?"

Neq left them then, afraid to discover how much Tyl knew. The man was embarrassingly well versed in Neq's private life, though he had given no hint of this before.

Neq ran through the forest until he was gasping for breath, then threw himself down in the dry leaves and sobbed. This merciless reopening of the old, deep wound; this sheer indignity of public analysis!

He lay there some time, and perhaps he slept. As darkness came he saw again the bloody forest floor, felt again the fire of severed hands. Six years had become as six hours, in the agony of Neqa's loss.

What use was it to practice vengeance, when every tribe was as savage as the one he had destroyed. Any one of those outlaw tribes could have done the same. The only answer was to ignore the problem--or to abolish them all. Or at least to abolish their savagery. To strike at the root. To rebuild Helicon.

Yet here he was, after having tried his best to organize that reconstruction, subject to the bitterness of a girl who saw him as the same kind of savage. With reason. How could a savage eliminate savagery?

It was all useless. None of it could recover the woman he had loved. The body lay there, tormenting him, mocking his efforts to reform. The musky perfume of the vine-lotus enhanced its horror. He didn't care.

After a time he rose to bury the corpse. He was a savage, but Dr. Jones was civilized. Neq coMd not help himself, but he could help the crazies. He had loved one of them--this one. To that extent he loved them all. He bent to touch the body, knowing his hand would strike something else, whatever it was that was really there. A stone, perhaps.

The flesh was there, and it was warm. It was a woman.

"Neqa!" he cried, wild hope surging.

Then he knew. "Vara," he muttered, turning away in disgust. What preposterous deceit!

She scrambled up and came after him, circling her arms about his waist. "Tyl told me--told me why you killed. I would have killed tool I blamed you falsely!"

"No," he said, prying ineffectively at her arms with the heel of his pincers. "What I did was useless, only making more grief. And I did kill Var." The fumes were stronger. She looked like Neqa.

"Yes!" she screamed, clinging as he moved. "I hate you for that! But now I understand! I understand how it happened."

"Then kill me now." As so many had begged him, when he stalked Yod's tribe. "You have honored Tyl's stricture."

"But you haven't!" Her grip on him tightened.

"The vine is here. I smell it. Let me go before--before I forget."

"I brought the vine! So there would be truth between us!"

He batted at her arms with the closed pincers. "There can be no truth between us! Tyl would have us defile our bracelets--"

"I know! I know! I know!" she cried. "Be done with it, Minos! Set me free!" She climbed him, reaching for his face with her mouth. She was naked; she had been that way when he first touched her, as she played corpse.

The flower drug sang complex melodies within his brain, making him overreact on an animal level to this female provocation. He crushed her to him within the living portion of his embrace, joining his lips to hers.

It was savagely sweet.

She relaxed, fitting more neatly within the circle of his arms. The glockenspiel jangled against the pincers, jolting him into momentary awareness of their situation. In that moment he wrenched away from her. His body was aflame with lust, but his mind screamed dishonor! He ran.

She ran too, fleetly. "I hate you!" she panted. "I hate your handsome face! I hate your wonderful voice! I hate your fertile penis! But I have to do it!"

In the dark he smashed into brush and spun about, trying to avoid the tangle. She dived for him again. He fended her off with the claw, trying not to hurt her but determined to keep her at bay until the narcotic wore off.

As long as she was desirable to him, he had to balk her ardor.

Now she was fighting him. She had fetched a stick along the way, a branch of a tree, and she struck him about the shoulders with it, hard enough to hurt. He knocked it away, then caught it in the pincers and wrenched it loose by superior strength. But her hands remained busy, striking him on nerves so that the pain was excruciating. She had the combat art of the Weaponless, all right!

Yet muscle and experience counted heavily, and they both knew that Neq could subdue her at any time merely by striking her hard enough with his claw. She was not really trying to defeat him; her intent was to maintain physical contact until her sexuality became irresistible.

But they had left the vine behind. The air was clear, here, and so was his head. Neq saw no more visions, and reacted nomally. He had won.

Realizing this, Vara stopped abruptly. "So it didn't work," she said, as though she had merely stubbed her toe. "But I tried, didn't I?"

"Yes." How was it possible to comprehend her thought processes!

"So now it's real."

"Yes." He started to get up.

She was crying, with real tears. "You monster! You denied me my love, you denied me my vengeance, you even denied me my rationale. Are you going to deny me my humiliation too?"

Hers no more than his! "Yes."

She flung herself on him again, kissing him with her teary face, bearing him back against the brush. There was blood on her body where the branches Imd thorns had scraped her. "I call you by your name! Neq. Neq the Sword! No artifice between us. No deceit."

"No humiliation!" he said.

"No humiliation! Do you take me now as a woman--or do I take you as a man? It shall be!"

It had been a long time, she was highly desirable, and there were limits. Neq sighed. He, too, had tried. "It shall be."

They made love quickly, she doing more than he because he could not use his hands.

"I never completed the act with her," he said, both satisfied and bitter. "She was afraid...."

"I know," Vara said. "As were you." Then: "Now we have done it. Now there is no onus. Stay if you wish."

"It is only sex. I do not want to love you."

"You have loved me for a month," she said. "As I have you. Stay."

Neq stayed. It was the first time he had completed the act with any woman, and she must have known that too, but she did not show it. Gradually they explored each other, letting down the physical and emotional barriers. They did not talk; it was no longer necessary.

The second time it was much better. Vara showed him some of what she knew, and she seemed to be as experienced in this respect as he was in battle. But mostly it was love, unfettered.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The trip was done. The three reported to Dr. Jones at the crazy building. Tyl, the tacit leader, did the talking, summarizing Neq's search for missing people, Tyl's own trek with Neq, their encounter with Var and Vara, and their journey back--except for the dialogue and romance.

"Neq has renounced bis sword," Tyl concluded. "He wears the glockenspiel now. Yet he retains the capacity for leadership."

Dr. Jones nodded as though something significant had been said. "The others will no doubt take the matter under advisement."

Tyl and the crazy leader went to round up the "others." Neq and Vara took the vine outside where there was more light. They settled under a spreading tree.

"Tyl will be master of Helicon," Vara said. "See how close he is to the crazies."

Neq agreed. "He brings people together."

"You and I came together inevitably," she said with feminine certainty. "Helicon was your idea. You should be master."

"With this?" He uncovered the glockenspiel. "You could change it back. The sword is still there, underneath."

It was too complicated to explain that he never had been considered for the Helicon office. "If'"! wore the sword again, you would have to kill me."

She frowned, surprised. "I suppose I would."

A little boy about four years old wandered by, spotting them. "Who are you?" he asked boldly.

"Neq the Glockenspiel."

"Vara the Stick."

"I'm Jimi. You have funny hands."

"They are metal hands," Neq said, surprised that the boy had not been frightened. "To make music."

"My daddy Jim has metal guns. They make bangs."

"Music is better."

"It is not!"

"Listen." And Neq lifted the glockenspiel, took the little hammer in his pincers, and began to play. Then he sang:

A fanner one day was a traveling to town

Hey! Boom-fa-le-la,

sing fa-le-la,

boom fa-le-la lay!

Saw a crow in a tree way up in the crown

Hey! Boom fa-le-la,

sing fa-le-la,

boom fa-le-la lay!

"What's a town?" the boy inquired, impressed.

"A nomad camp with crazy buildings."

"I know what a boom falela is! A gun."

Vara laughed. "I want one like him," she murmured.

"Find Jim the Gun, then."

"After this one," she said, patting her abdomen.

Neq, startled, sang another verse for the boy.

Then the gun from his shoulder

he quickly brought down...

And he shot that black crow

and it fell to the ground...

"I told you guns were better!"

The feathers were made

into featherbeds neat...

And pitchforks were made

from the legs and the feet...

"How big was that crow?" Jimi inquired, fascinated. Neq struck a loud note. "About that size."

"Oh," the boy said, satisfied. "What's that thing?"

"A flower vine."

"It is not!"

"The flowers only open in the dark. Then they smell funny, and people do funny things."

"Like crows with pitchforks?"

Vara laughed again. "Just about," she said.

Tyl emerged from the building. "They're ready."

Vara picked up the vine-pot and they went inside. Jimi followed. "He has funny hands," he informed Tyl. "But he's fun."

They were all there: the group of odd-named oldsters he had rounded up, along with Dick the Surgeon, and Sola, and several more he did not know. Apparently Dr. Jones had located more of the people on the list during Neq's absence. Some were nomads, male and female. Jimi went to one of these, evidently Jim the Gun.