The Architect of Aeons (45 page)

A sour note entered his mind. As he pondered, wondering why this notice had been sent him, Norbert realized that to discuss the calendar while the Earth was under fire might be considered an act of sedition, and not keeping in the best interest of the Starfarers.

He thought longer, seeking an escape from this conclusion, any escape.

While it was Guild policy in theory not to interfere with terrestrials' affairs, it was also Guild policy in practice to minimize local disturbances in the cliometric calculus, to tamp down spikes or disburse strange attractors in the matrix of history, lest some revolution in technology or social continuity interfere with the smooth launching and landfall of the great ships.

Was this such an event? Even a few hundred thousand parallel calculations of six billion variables in his head showed that it must be an attractor basin, if not a vortex.

Norbert felt a suffocating moment, almost claustrophobic, when he realized that the decision was his. It could not be palmed off on any local or current authority, or any other member of the Guild, nor could he hire a bravo or roughneck to do the work. The verdict and its consequences would have his name affixed to it, and forever. He must find Zolasto, find Hieronymus, question the man, under torment if need be, run the calculations, weigh the dangers to the Guild, and spare or slay a human life. The ship ghosts were as unhelpful on the question of Zolasto Zo's whereabouts as they were about the manual for the desk and its printing slot.

Fieldwork was needed. He rang for his adjutant.

The wrong man came.

6. Ar Thurp End Ragon

His adjutant was supposed to be Nochzreniye of Nocturne of Epsilon Eridani, a star famed for its theonecromancers, and haunted by the still-speaking fragments of a long dead Power. Nochzreniye's people, the Zarya, were from the longitude of globe called First Hour, parallel to the motionless twilight terminator bisecting his world, and so their sun was always no more than a red-orange reflection against distant clouds and mountains. As their name implied, the Nocturnals were nocturnal, and Norbert appreciated being able to keep his cabin lights dimmed to a tolerable level.

Nochzreniye was also derived from a gene stock far removed from mankind's monkeylike origins. Ironically for a tree-dwelling species, it was remnants and echoes of man's monkey ancestors which made him prone to vertigo and fear of heights. When this gene-line had been removed from certain spacetraveling subspecies in order to correct for inner ear maladaptation to zero gee, it accidentally rendered certain lineages immune to fear of falling, Nocturnals and Rosicrucians among them.

Partly as a joke and partly out of the sheer bloody-mindedness for which the Brash archetype was famous, Norbert had removed the outer wall leading to his office and narrowed the resulting unrailed balcony to half a standard gangway width, leaving a windy ledge overlooking the Village rooftops so far below. It amused him to see earthmen, so proud of their base-stock genes, when summoned to his office, to come down the gangway, gripping the wall and taking baby steps, trying not to look down.

But this new adjutant was different. When he stepped out on the unexpectedly narrow and railless ledge, like an earthman he touched the wall and measured the depth of the fall with his eyes. His first step was tentative. But by his second step, he was gliding along with the goat-footed grace of a non-orthogonal biopsychological type like a Nocturne or Rosicrucian. But everything else about him, facial hair, number of teeth, vestigial tissue linking thumb and hand, even (if Norbert was any judge of footwear) separate toes, indicated a very conservative gene profile ergo an orthogonal brain structure.

The new adjutant gave a crisp salute, holding up his glove to his eyes, palm out, and had his orders flicker across his palm, along with his name and rank, duty station and other general data, licenses, qualifications, tolerances and immunizations. Norbert did not rise, but returned the ceremonial salute casually, holding his shining palm toward the data so that his uniform would have a record of the new man's files and preferences. Both men lowered their hands when the gloves showed transmission sent and received, the new man sharply, Norbert by covering his mouth in a yawn.

“Ar Thurp End Ragon? By the dangling Bachelor, what kind of name is that? I don't recognize the format. Which part is your privy name and which is your gene-line? And why is your age marked as classified? I've never seen anyone's age marked
classified
.”

“A remarkably old name, sir. We put the family name last.”

The new man's voice was surprisingly deep and melodic, rich with nuances of tone. Norbert did not know, even after so long on the senile homeworld of man, what archetypes the baselines and firstling folk used. But this man must have downloaded psychological structures for the magnetic personality type. The ringing voice was regal, genial, jovial, slightly sly, slightly dangerous. It was the kind of archetype that dumb kids eager for rank and ladies' favors would like.

Norbert would have wagered that this was a guy who fenced with a blade, threw red roses to damsels, and invented sonnets in iambic pentameter to mock his foes after a swordfight but before escaping through a kicked-out window on a white silk line. Norbert knew enough about mudra and mandala to recognize the nerve-muscle traces of the type. It was something about the devilish twinkle in his eye.

And yet something did not fit. Norbert could not figure how the Firstling had adapted from baseline to non-orthogonal psychology so quickly. No one could swap out a sub-personality that promptly. It was almost as if the fellow had rewritten his base neural structural command sequences, his own instinctive reactions, on the fly.

“End Ragon, then?” said Norbert, attempting an avuncular smile. “Well, Able Starman End Ragon, the mission here concerns a calendar reformer. Describe the controversy to me.”

“Sir,” the squire said crisply, “according to the Unrevised Vindication Calendar, Jupiter should have ignited the Fourth Great Burn of the deceleration beam four hundred fifty years ago, but the Revised Anomaly Calendar says the Fourth Burn is not due for another one thousand five hundred fifty years, and we all must fast on short energy rations and conserve until then.”

Norbert nodded. “Go on.”

“The Revisionists say that since no flare of launch light from Canes Venatici was detected at the due time, an X-ray anomaly two thousand years later was the launch. Hence, the Swan Princess who stole a star doubtless tarried at M3, and the Vindication of Man will be long delayed. The Vindictive say the Vindication comes on schedule, but that the Authority at M3 has given some novel means of propulsion to the vessel, which humble Earthly science cannot detect; and they say the anomaly was some small exogalactic matter swept into the bowshock of her sail at near-lightspeed, suffering total conversion.”

“Perfect,” said Norbert. “Your answer comes straight out of the Political Officer's Correct Attitude Manual. So the Vindictives are as mad as everyone on this mad world here, and curse the darkness of the deceleration beam, and are shooting at the cities of the machines in protest, to show one and all what near-lightspeed can do. Therefore, what is your opinion of the matter?”

“That it is an injudicious matter to discuss openly.”

“Correct! But if you are directly ordered to voice your opinion by a superior? What is your opinion then?”

“That, given the Treaty of Jupiter which ended the Crusades, every loyal man should follow the calendar of the local prince and current lord placed over him. For the Inner System of Sol, that means to follow the Summer Kings, who are Revisionists.”

“More correct! And what should we Starfarers do, since we sail from star to star, and are loyal to no local princes, but loyal only to the dream of the Vindication of Man?”

“We should not discuss the matter at all, and give our dates in the sacerdotal reckoning.”

“Most correct of all! But the Starfaring Guild does not like wars, revolutions, or reformations, because they disrupt the Launch Schedule. That means loudmouthed men, even men of the cloth, who discuss the calendar reform too openly must, for the good of the Guild, be silenced, because there is no Vindication for Man if the starships sail not.”

Norbert leaned back, waiting to see if the other man would say anything. The other man stood at ease with no expression on his face, and said nothing. Norbert took that as a good sign.

“How do you feel about killing priests, Able Starman End Ragon? They are notoriously Unrevised.”

“Actually, sir, if I may?”

“Mm?”

“It would be
Squire,
not
Able Starman,
since I am affixed to the Marine Family and Clan avowed to this base, practiced in the gentlemanly arts of blade, speaking whip, mudra, and shorepistol”—Norbert congratulated himself. He knew a bravo when he saw one.—“and assigned to you in your role as Special Airlock Operations Agent, not in your role as Praetor.” Special Airlock Operations was the archaic euphemism for Ship's Assassin.

“What? Dangle it! I have no role as Praetor. I am a Quaestor.” Norbert held up his glove again, and performed the salute to send the data flow across his palm.

The new man held up his palm and saluted, this time more slowly, pausing the playback as his final orders appeared. “Actually, sir, if I may, I have been ordered to report to an officer named Norbert of ideal-type Brash of line, phylum and family Noesis Mynyddrhodian mab Nwyfre of Dee Parish, North Polar Continent, planet Rosycross, venerable of a.d. 51550, and the rank is Praetor. It seems you have been given a brevet increase in rank, at least temporarily, for this mission. Did the No
ö
sphere not inform you?”

“Zznah?!”
The Brash were supposed to be coolheaded, and take startling news nonchalantly, or with an airy jest, but this was so unexpected that Norbert emitted the shrill nasal noise of a true hillcountry Rosicrucian before the archetype habituation cells in his cortex could react. “I-im-imp-impossible! No one becomes a Praetor straight from Aedile! The rank of Quaestor interposes! And even for a Quaestor, there is supposed to be a board of review! A midnight vigil! An augury and—by all the Bachelors!—and I am not qualified! I don't have the years lost or the years served! Unwed it! Un-
WED
!”

“Is that a swearword among your people, sir? It sounds stoop— Ah—it sounds mildly unusual.”

“Sorry. Didn't mean to curl your virgin ears. We are married before we are born on my planet, so we don't have anyone not helping to swell the underpopulation numbers. Since the first marriage is nonconsensual and never consummated, our sacerdotes permit an annulment of the first wife after you've been married to a second wife for a year. It is not so bad, since we are a Torch World, no more than a hundred thousand miles from our sun, so a year is about a week long.”

Norbert realized he was rambling, and snapped his mouth shut. But talking—especially talking about his home—had given him the moment he needed to deploy his Brash archetype structures in his cortex. The artificial nerve cells sent messages to his organic cells, released chemicals in his bloodstream, and so on. He could feel the change in his posture and body language like an actor settling into a character role. He was calm. He was unmoved and immovable, yet eager for action, equally willing to live for a laugh as die spitting in the executioner's eye. He was brash!

“I get it,” said Norbert. “The ghosts of the old captains and shipmasters used their right of intervention for the sake of the Guild. No time for the proper ceremonies. So I get picked because I am a nobody. I kill the damned unwed Vindicator Breastbeater and shut his big mouth, for I have no family name here on Earth for anyone to retaliate against, right? What can the Summer Kings do, make it snow on me alone? And if I don't kill him, or something gets flared up, I can be decommissioned for having exceeded my authority, and turned over to the currents. Jettisoned. Dropped out the waste lock.”

With no further word, he doffed the dark spectacles he wore at all times, buckled on a shoulder belt holding his weapons, and donned his full face mask of black smartfabric, and drew up his hood. The weapons were matched antiques like stilettoes with blades of blue glass and scorpion-tail grips; the weapons emitted a dour, mordant aura on the emotion channel, but never spoke. The entire surface of the mask and cloak, not just the area over his eyes, was light sensitive, and fed the images directly into his cortex, so he did not need to don his black spectacles again: but he liked the way they looked, for they gave his facelessness a memorable accent.

Impishly, he flexed his shoulders to trigger the silent billow and hem-floating of his cape. The New Guy did not flinch in instinctive decompression-fear as a spacer would have seeing the black cape a-billow, but he did not react as an earthman either, who would have noticed the glaring exception to the sumptuary laws with a raised eyebrow, or a studied attempt at nonchalance.

This squire fellow instead looked at the cape lining, and his eye motions did the typical posthuman jitter of rapid information absorption. What was going on? The guy was studying how a normal cape-circuit worked? He did not know about living thread?

Norbert could not even remember how long ago living thread had been invented. Was it before the rise of the Fourth Humans, or after? It was a Fox Maiden technology, something they spun from special glands their vixanthropic powers allowed them to control, wasn't it?

The first Fox, Cazi, had been perfected somewhere near the year Minus 30000. The current year was Minus 17444. One hundred twenty-five centuries later.

How old was this squire? The most distant world in the Empyrean Polity of Man was Uttaranchal of 83 Leonis at fifty-eight lightyears hence. A voyage there and back would only let Einstein steal a century. Had this man made the long faring across the Vasty Deep one hundred twenty-five times? Then he would have been the most famed figure in history, not a squire of marines with some odd name.