Courtship Rite

35

VERY CAREFULLY FROM behind the sand bags Joesai pulled the wire attached to the thumb that tripped the hammer. The air cracked! Then: deaf silence. Neither Joesai nor Gaet breathed for heartbeats. They ran over and examined the acrid-smelling tube. It wasn’t split. A hole had appeared in the wooden target.

“God’s Streak!” said Gaet, jumping up and down like a boy.

Joesai roared with laughter. “By God! You just tell those og’Sieth to build something and they build it.”

Joesai opened the breach and put in another cartridge and screwed the breach closed. The cartridges had taken him a whole day to make. It was easy to use Shoemi’s Method to calculate the structure of an organic compound that would break down into gases with a sudden release of energy — but cooking up the compound itself was scary. Such molecules are fragile. In the end he had used two explosives, one to detonate the other. God had said nothing to suggest an appropriate explosive and he wasn’t sure that he had the right ones.

“This pressure tube has use in some ritual?” asked Gaet.

“God alone knows. It is used for putting holes in things.” The larger brother examined the hole in the wooden target with some care. A drill would have done much better. “I think it is mainly used to punch holes in distant people. A knife for cowards.”

“A killing tool?” Gaet was not sure how it could be used in such a fashion. Perhaps the tube could be set up so that someone tripped over the trigger wire.

“It is held against the shoulder. You pull the metal thumb with your forefinger while you keep the tube lined up with whatever you wish to hole. Do you want to grasp it in your hands for the next explosion?” Joesai enjoyed teasing his brother.

“Do I look the fool?”

Joesai was cracking up laughing. “Not a fool. Perhaps a coward? You’re not going to take God’s word that such is safe?”

“Suddenly I hear Oelita’s voice preaching atheism in my ear.”

“She has begun to talk to you?”

“Yes.”

“Same old bees in her robe?”

“She’s not going to change. Why should we all believe the same thing?”

“Why should we believe lies? Go ahead, believe a stone is a potato — but you’ll break your teeth! She signs contracts with Hoemei as if she were Kaiel. Ho. I grant you that she is as tough as the bi-wood that bends but cannot be carved. Still her mind is pudding.”

“She has a simple reverence for life that I respect.”

“She has a simpleminded reverence for falsehood. Before I leave I shall show her God. I vow that.”

“The Death Rite is ended!” said Gaet as a command.

Joesai smiled cunningly. “You would protect her from words?”

“Husband, she’s had enough,” Gaet pleaded.

“You pity her,” Joesai exclaimed in astonishment. They were creche and they did not pity. To pity was to insult. “She rots your mind with her sexy wiggle. How is it that you did not answer my question? If a Trial of Words destroys her, can she be Kaiel?”

“How will you show her the truth of God? How can you show the sky to a blind man?”

“And I ask you, how can she deny the revelations of God that appear from her own crystal? I’ll show her this.” He shook his steel spitter-of-lead-pebbles. “How could I have built this except at the command of God?” He mused, holding God’s revealed weapon. “What I hold is called a ‘rifle’. Actually the description was enigmatic and I had to use my imagination. I had quite a discussion with your og’Sieth friend trying to reconstruct the fine details. Teenae verified my logic. The deduction demanded skill because there was no description of how the rifle worked. All I have is a few anecdotal recountings of its use. The World in the Sky is a weird world of killers. I’ll show you a passage when we go back to the Palace that tells the story of hill people wandering around with rifles holing Russian priests who live inside mobile temples of steel four thumbs thick. That impressed me.”

“A God who preaches killing will not impress Oelita.”

Joesai lifted the rifle to his shoulder and aimed into the hill…

“No!” screamed Gaet.

… and pulled the metal thumb. There was another crack! a terrible impact against his shoulder, and a flying chip of stone. “The logic that will destroy her mind if she is unwilling to change is this: God saved us from a world where they were breeding only for better killers. He did not speak to us of this until we had learned of ourselves to breed for better values. Now He tells us how to kill again through Oelita who has brought us His words. It is a test to see what we have learned. God is Oelita’s partner. Can her mind survive knowing that? God abhors Death and through her gives us limitless new ways of Death. What Oelita cannot face today, and must face if she is to survive, is that Death will stop neither for her nor for God. Death is senior to us all. We win only by tricking Death to our own purpose, which is the breeding of kalothi.”

The argument continued while they loaded and flung five lead pebbles. It slogged along intermittently as Getasun, at highnode, found the brothers concentrating their attention on a test of the portable rayvoice. They contacted the Palace and left a message for Hoemei that said simply, “Creche reunion of the Wooden Triangle at sunset.” The argument continued more vigorously on Gaet’s skrei-wheel, bumping back into the city, packsack loaded on the bars and rifle lashed to Joesai’s shoulders. When Hoemei met them in his Palace apartment, its tables readied with cold feast, one of the Liethe playing softly as she sat by the window, legs crossed, the argument languished into an off trail and had to be reintroduced later.

The Liethe, unhurried, concluded her melodious piece before she rose, bowed, and helped them out of their clothes. She was temporarily waylaid in her gentle task by a fascination for the cold steel tube with its strange attachments. “What is this?” Her fingers stroked the barrel.

“A device for quieting inquisitive women,” Joesai joked.

Receiving his joke as a command to be silent, she led them to their bath without even a rustle from her robe. Her delicate hands began to massage away their tiredness, with the dirt, running the warm water over their bodies in a relaxing glory.

Hoemei pulled up a cushion. “I hear Kathein has found the title page.”

“Have you been reading the revelations?” asked Joesai.

“I haven’t had a moment! God’s Feet have been kicking me. Tonight I have a tryst with Teenae for the evening and she promises to read to me selections from the foul book if I properly satisfy her bodily hungers. I’ve missed the excitement. My God, on top of everything I now have duties to the Gathering.”

“Bendaein won’t use you!” Joesai spat scornfully.

Hoemei sighed. “I’m into the Gathering because of you. Some private organizing for your benefit. Bendaein knows nothing of my efforts.”

Joesai glared at Hoemei, telling him to shut up while they were in the same room with one of Aesoe’s spies.

“She’s loyal to me, Joesai.”

“You’d trust your own mother, if you had one.”

“It was Honey who found your men in Soebo.”

Without missing a knead of his muscles, she spoke. “They are held underground at the Temple of Raging Seas. Some high sea priest thinks it will prove useful to keep them alive.”

“She is apprenticed to rayvoice work with me. Aesoe does not know and would not be pleased.”

Joesai turned to the woman with the smooth skin who had stripped herself to the waist so that she would not wet her robe. “So it was you who set my heart at rest? I thank you.” He reached over and squeezed her wrist with a vice grip that was the custom when acknowledging a debt that would be paid whenever it was called, now or a generation from now.

“All I will ever need is to serve you well.” She dropped her eyes and concentrated on washing his knees.

Immediately he began to like this strange being regardless of his unwillingness to trust her. He thought for several more heartbeats about trusting her. Nevertheless he changed the subject to a non-sensitive topic. “What does the title page say?”

“God is revealing to us the History of Man. Oelita’s crystal is a fragment of Volume 1: The Cradle Earth.”

“Earth — the Riethe of the Heroic Solo Chant!” yelped Joesai in an eruption of water that drowned Gaet and spattered the Liethe.

“Very possibly. There are eight major parts to the Cradle Volume. We have only Sequence 1: The Forge of War.”

“Those damn words that mean nothing!” stormed Joesai. “I have fourteen pages from Kathein by now, and most of it doesn’t make sense.”

Gaet had riffled through his neat memory for names and places and was smiling. “Forge would mean furnace or kiln or crematorium. There is a reference to a fierj in the Children’s Chant. ‘Gowan gaien to fierj the shoes for Horse.’ Among the og-Sieth on the shores of the Aramap the word foerj means to work softened metal. It is sometimes used as a synonym for cremation as in the curse, ‘May your poisoned innards be foerged while your family starves.’”

“I’ve crossed the word ‘war’ in my readings,” Joesai recalled. “It means nothing to me. It occurs in conjunction with the words ‘kill’ and ‘peace’. I speculate that it is a killing game and peace the opening move.”

“I have read none of it so I cannot guess,” said Hoemei. “Kathein favors the translation ‘Furnace of Violence’, others prefer ‘The Kiln of Fire’ or simply ‘The Crematorium’.”

“There are references to crematoriums,” continued Joesai. “The People of the Sky are not nourished by the people they kill so it is logical to infer that poisoning is a widespread means of inducing Contribution. Or did they poison themselves to deny their enemy nourishment? I found one reference to factory crematoriums on a scale vaster than I would believe had I not seen God’s word of its truth. The whole population of Kaiel-hontokae would be consumed in weeks by such a Black Temple. Then there was a reference to a city that flamed so fiercely in a firestorm that its whole population was burned or asphyxiated. Many sentences contain messages by powerful priests implying a readiness to vaporize cities. Burning defenseless villages was a popular aspect of the game. The children danced as torches for the victors. But crematorium is not specific enough. What of the rifle? I like Gaet’s og’Sieth word ‘foerj’. Into what shape would such violence work a man’s metal? We can thank God for our deliverance.”

“Praise God if such was the world of our conception,” said Gaet.

“Praise God,” said Hoemei with ritual fervor.

The Liethe girl said nothing. She dried their dripping bodies and brought them lounging robes dyed with red alizarin and went back to her tiny string instrument that permeated the conversation, listening.

“Do read about their clan interlockings, Hoemei. You’ll be fascinated. They had priest clans as dedicated to random killing as we are to kalothi.”

Hoemei was devouring bread with gobs of bean and nut spread in profane taimu sauce. “Did they have a central government?”

“I don’t think so, I’m confused. What can fourteen pages say of something as complex as an oz’Numae tapestry? I think the Marx priests formed a great government once but they had communication problems and broke up into Russians, Imperialists, Communists, Chinese, Socialists, Runindogs, Libyans, Fascists, Lackies, Trotskies, Gaulists, Revisionists, Kgbers, and Albanians. After that my memory runs out. The other side was simpler. There were the Amerikan priests and the Israeli priests, and their allies the Opeckers, the Capitalists, the Multinationals and the Degeneratburjwa.”

“Who won?” asked Hoemei with his mouth full.

“God has not revealed. I’m casting my bet toward the Imperialists. They always have an alliance at the right time and the right place. First the Russians are screaming insults at an Imperialist-Amerikan alliance, and then you turn the page and the Amerikans are off on a sacred Gathering against the Imperialist-Russian alliance.” Joesai was amused.

“Your story sounds like Getan history with the clan names altered,” grumbled Gaet.

“It sounds so because I’ve been skipping the details. Those Sky People have more ways of cutting your throat than you could dream. Conceive how popular a priest clan must be if its priests dare not visit another country except in mobile temples made of steel four thumbs thick.”

“Will you not need such an impregnable cart when you enter Soebo?” With that speech, Hoemei came to the purpose of the meeting. He spoke as he had at those intense discussions in the high tower of the creche or in the field or in a hastily found stairwell when one of them was in danger from the Trials. First there had been four maran brothers. Now there were three.

“She must leave.” Joesai was uncomfortable with the silken silent woman.

“She stays,” said Hoemei.

The Liethe put aside her instrument and caught Joesai with her liquid eyes. “It is the code of my clan to take the secrets of our men to the grave. An Ivieth is vowed with his life to take you to your destination. An og’Sieth stands by the craftsmanship of his creations. An o’Tghalie will not take two and then two and give you back three. A Liethe is a priest’s servant.”

“What say you, Gaet?” asked Joesai.

“She must make an oath.”

The Queen of Life-before-Death sank to her knees. “Let God’s Ears hear me. Nothing I sense in this chamber shall pass my mouth or fingers without permission from all of you. I serve your wishes.”

“The Death Oath,” said Joesai, unmoved.

Without objection she brought a needle. She pierced her finger and, when one red drop rose upon the fingertip, touched Joesai’s tongue so that he might taste her blood.

“I cannot tell you apart,” he said. “The oath is upon your sisters also.”

She bowed and found her place again.

Hoemei spoke. “I invited her here. She is more bound than you might think.” He brought out maps, unfolding them after pushing the food aside. “Bendaein does not trust himself to my new powers. They are not part of the tradition. But with the rayvoice I can reach farther than Bendaein. And I have done so. I have the outposts. The Liethe” — he nodded to Honey — “have been most helpful in transmissions of the call to Gathering. They know the priests who can act. I have decided not to demand action, or bargain, or offer alliance concessions. Instead, I have sent out the fastest Ivieth runner relays carrying the eggs of the tainted under-jaw so that they might confirm this abomination for themselves. I’m appealing to their self-interest. Who will be willing to accept a biological attack upon our food supply? It is too dangerous, and added to drought and natural disaster, such threat is intolerable. I anticipate massive support.”

Joesai objected. “Bendaein is himself certain of support. He is not certain that the Gathering will survive the route to bring Judgment upon the Mnankrei. He wishes to travel light with few but able men.”

“Such are the contradictions within Aesoe’s inner circle,” replied Hoemei. “He has visualized a planetary economy but he cannot handle the logistics of a large Gathering. I can, and I have done the preparation. The whole Gathering shall not converge upon Soebo. Nine of ten will work to maintain the supply depots.”

“All this while we feed the coast?” snarled Joesai.

“What is needed exists along the routes I have chosen. It is a matter of organization and coordination, not material.”

Joesai was unsatisfied with a solution that seemed to evade the central issue. “My problem is not numbers. I would be happy to hit Soebo with a Gathering of Ten. I’d prefer it.”

“But such a Gathering would lack moral force. Since the other clans would not have participated, they would not abide by its decisions.”

Philosophy! “Why is my death to be useful to Aesoe’s ends?” That was what concerned Joesai. “Perhaps she knows?”

The woman smiled faintly. Her liquid eyes sparked like the sea. “I am under Aesoe’s oath. I cannot speak.”

Joesai grumbled. “It is a setup. A successful Inquest in the Plaza at Soebo would require a verbal dancer, a man of great wit and irresistible charm, and a fast sidestepper. Even then, he would be murdered. I suggest you, Gaet. A much wiser choicel You take this mission and welcome to it!”

“But a rock-fisted man who insults at the first opportunity is what Aesoe wants.”

“Because he needs a dead man!”

“Exactly,” said Gaet.

“And if I do it my way, swift, and without foot-kissing, I still get murdered.”

“Exactly,” said Gaet.

“Which is why you will do it my way.” Hoemei’s manner was that of a surgeon at work. “You will not enter Soebo with your advance party. You will stay a day’s march from the town and do nothing.”

“God’s Itch, you know I have not the mental capacity to do nothing!”

“You will not rescue your men. You will not make court. You will not fight. You will do nothing. I have my prediction registered in the Archives about the outcome of this affair. It is based on the assumption that you will do nothing. Aesoe has his prediction of the outcome of this event registered in the Archives. His outcome requires your death, perhaps to demonstrate Mnankrei unwillingness to host an Inquest. He does not think you capable of doing nothing. Thus that is what you will do to survive. My solution aids mankind, the Kaiel, and my brother.”

Joesai’s whole inner body was rebelling. Do nothing in the middle of enemy territory? Impossible! “And I just sit there while the Mnankrei skin me alive?”

“The Mnankrei will be poised to respond to your game, and you will have no game. Besides, God is on our side.“ Hoemei grinned at the lethal rifle parked against the door. ”You will have one hundred of those with you. They will not approach you. You will not have to use them.”

Joesai calmed himself. Hoemei was faster of mind than anyone he knew. Survival meant listening to an unshakably loyal brother who had proven his worth. “You know something I don’t know.”

“We are looking at the same chess board.”

Joesai thought about that. His brother had just insulted his intelligence. “If I move to a position one square from Soebo and sit there painting my nails, it is checkmate, eh?”

“In three moves.”

“He is marvelously brilliant,” said the Liethe creature proudly. She had been watching Hoemei. She saw that he was thirsty and rose to bring him a drink before he knew that himself.

Gaet smiled affectionately at Joesai. “Don’t look so bewildered, husband. Hoemei and I have done much feeling in the dark while you’ve been gone.”

Hoemei was cleaning up the meal so that the rubble would not be left for Honey. To keep her out of the way, he insisted she play a melody for them. “And how is Kathein?” The timbre of his voice mixed concern and bitterness.

“Why?” asked Joesai sullenly.

“You’ve seen her more than we have of late.”

“She assaulted me!” exclaimed Joesai indignantly.

Gaet, who had been alerted by the mention of Kathein’s name, rolled off his pillow, chuckling. “She hit you?”

“With verbal fists! I bled internally!”

Gaet stamped his enthusiasm. “She’s learning! I didn’t know she had it in her! That’s a good sign.”

Hoemei, making quick work of the dishes, only smiled.

“And you insects pass for my brothers!” Thoughts of Kathein depressed Joesai.

“We’ll talk more on the morrow. I don’t want to be late for Teenae, and I have flowers to pick up on the way,” said Hoemei.

Gaet didn’t like to see his brother brooding. “Joesai, spend the night with me and Noe at the Great Cloister.”

“No,” rejoined Hoemei. “He should stay here and study my file on Soebo. Honey will spice his time and make his rest a pleasure.”

So, thought Joesai, Hoemei offers the luxuries of the flesh to his uncouth brother who cannot inspire love. Wasn’t that Gaet’s role? He felt sarcastic until he remembered… Noe’s warm teasing… the smile that always lit little Teenae’s eyes under her lush eyebrows. “Wait,” he said, “I have messages.” He took paper and wrote two poems. For Teenae: