Jewel of Tharn

Chapter Eleven

For a month by Blade's way of reckoning time, he was feted and feasted and revered by the People of Tharn. Astar's body was vaporized - the story being circulated that she died of joyful shock on recognizing the true Mazda - and Blade now shared the throne with Isma. One by one, each woman individually, was presented to him. He counted them. 927. The People. THEY. The upper and ruling class of Tharn, in turn ruled by Isma and, now, himself.

Isma watched coldly as each woman was presented to Blade. So far Isma had been subdued, docile and loving, and Blade was careful that his glance never rested too long on any woman, and his manner remained curt and aloof. Sutha advised this and Blade knew he was right.

Each of the women was a beauty in her own right. Defective females were destroyed at birth. There was every combination of coloring and feature, but all were tall and seemingly ageless. None old. None young. Blade learned that each woman, each homid, as well as the neuters, was allotted a certain number of kronos. When the time came the individual was destructed, routinely and without ceremony, and a substitute moved in from the birth plants.

He visited the Cage, where the young Lordsmen were kept and bred in captivity until each generation reached the age of sacrifice. They lived well, the young men of Tharn, waited on hand and foot by neuters and ceboids from the time they were born until they died in the arena. They were poor specimens, all of them, but it was on their semen, milked and injected into the Bearer Maidens, that Tharn depended for life and continuity. Blade would change all that. His seed was strong.

Blade came to understand the rigid social structure of Tharn. He intended to change this, too, when he was in actual fact ruler of Tharn, but now he observed and listened, gulping knowledge down in huge bites, trying to digest it against the day when he would need it.

Until his arrival Tharn had been an absolute autocracy ruled by a Queen-Goddess and a High Priestess descending in an unbroken line for millions of kronos The real administration was carried on by a Council of Neuters, headed by a King of Neuters, in this case Sutha. The neuters ran Tharn, but had no real authority over the elite, the People. They had life and death authority over all minor neuters and the ceboids.

There were four main Provos in Tharn, and in each the head neuter had absolute authority, responsible in theory to Sutha, but in fact each Provo was a small Kingdom in its own right. As long as the mani kept coming in, and there was no open revolt, the Provos were left alone. This made it easy for ambitious neuters like Honcho to plot against Urcit. Blade would change all this, too, when the time came.

The Maidukes and the Bearer Maidens, though also homids, were little better than high-class servants. Blade visited the baby plants, where long lines of Bearer Maidens were in various stages of gestation. Only one male child in a hundred was kept for possible graduation to the Cage; the others were quickly suffocated in a small transparent bag of teksin.

Nor were all the girl children kept alive, though the percentage was higher than the male. There was a feral judgment scale: only the absolutely perfect females were kept for eventual membership in the People. Those only slightly less perfect were destined to become Maidukes, and the next gradation down were made Bearer Maidens. All the rest were destroyed.

Blade saw the error immediately and wondered at the Tharnians. The third rate of female homids were bearing the children. Children fathered at a distance by a poor strain of male Lordsmen in which the blood had deteriorated to physical malformation and near imbecility. The paradox intrigued Blade. The Tharnians manipulated magnetic force with ease; yet they had never heard of eugenic law.

Neuters were not born of women. Part of the semen bank was set apart and given special chemical treatment, then neuters were created in bottles, or decanters, and set into motion on a conveyor belt. It was a long process - the neuter plant was a Tharnian mile long - and what went in as a fertilized speck of protoplasm in a bottle came out as a neuter infant. Along the way it was subject to dozens of shots with a high pressure hypodermic. When it was decanted it was segregated and graded in classes from A to E and in levels from 1 to 14. The neuters grew rapidly, much faster than homid children, and each was electronically taught and conditioned for the task it was allotted. Each was given a certain number of kronos to exist, according to a carefully rated efficiency chart and at the end of that time was destroyed.

Ceboids bore their young naturally. From the ceboids came the lower grades of soldiers and all the menial workers, the hewers and the carriers and the sweepers of dung. They lived mainly in slums on the outskirts of Urcit, spoke their own brutish language, and were as faithful as dogs to the master of the moment.

Blade could not wholly satisfy himself about the ceboids. They were hybrids, representing various strains of animals, but with no one predominant animal strain. Their intelligence was universally low. Even Sutha could not satisfy Blade's curiosity about them. There had always been ceboids, for millions of kronos, and Tharn could not exist without them. Who would do the work?

Sutha and Blade held frequent conferences to plan their strategy. Honcho must make his move soon. Sutha, by the subtle control of power, made it easy for Honcho. They waited. Still nothing. Sutha weakened the magveils still more. If Honcho was probing he must find the weakness.

Blade and Isma were in the Regal Chamber when it happened. They had had a long and arduous bout and Isma slept in contentment, a half smile on her lovely face. Blade, stretched on the great bed beside her, the sword close at hand, was not surprised, nor particularly alarmed, when the simlu of Honcho began to materialize. He did not move a hand toward the sword. A simlu could not harm him, and at this stage Honcho would not dare teleport his real into Urcit.

Honcho was wearing light armor and a tunic. The long green eyes glinted at Blade and he showed his fanged white teeth in half a smile. Blade nodded a welcome and said nothing.

Honcho stared past Blade at the sleeping Isma. His eyes roved over her body, naked save for a light robe of frilled teksin.

"She is as lovely as I thought, Blade. It is the first time I have seen her. How is she in coi? Satisfactory?"

Blade nodded. "Most."

"Then you are happy? Content? You must be - you did not adhere to our plan."

Blade smiled. "Did you really think I would?"

Honcho rubbed his shaven head with a finger. "No. Of course not. I knew you would not destroy the Power. And be destroyed yourself. You are not a fool, Blade. I could not use you if you were."

Blade raised himself on an elbow, careful not to disturb Isma. "Then why did you suggest such a plan in the first place?"

The neuter blinked. "I had to test you. You, a stranger from a strange place I did not know. You might have been a fool!"

"So now you know," said Blade. "I am not a fool. I am Mazda, or most of Urcit thinks I am, and I rule with Isma."

Honcho nodded, as if to himself. "So I planned it. I had two plans, really. First, if you were a fool, you would destroy the Power, and yourself, and my Pethcines would easily overrun Tharn and Urcit. It was, and I now admit it, really not such a good plan. I would have Tharn, but I would not have the Power. It would have taken a long time to restore the Power, if I could have done it at all, and I need the Power to control Org and the Pethcines. They are savages, as perhaps you remember?"

"I remember. How is Totha?"

Honcho's smiled thinned. The green eyes narrowed. "As ever, Blade. But she has changed. She used to hate me, hold me in contempt, now she seems to like me. I think I know why, but I still find it pleasant. She has, or very nearly, taught me to understand coi."

Blade's taunt was deliberate. "How can that be? You are not a man. You are a neuter. A nothing!"

Honcho shrugged and spread his long fingered, nearly prehensile hands in a knowing gesture. "Perhaps.

Perhaps not. Even that may be changed. Totha thinks it may be, and she is very interested. All the miracles, Blade, are not performed here in Urcit."

Blade became very alert. "What does that mean?"

Honcho could not repress his gloating. "Many, many kronos ago, Blade, before the system was perfected, and all things became static, there was a thing called sickness in Tharn. And there were men, homids, called surgeons. I have read of them. Some were very wise and skilled. Then they vanished, were ruled extinct, because they were not needed. But a few survived. I have been searching all Tharn for a long time, and I have found one. In a remote corner of West Provo. I sent ceboids and had him secretly brought to my Tower. He tells me that there is a thing, something called an operation, that will make me a man. In body as I already am in brain. What do you say to that, Blade?"

Blade was amused but he did not let Honcho see it. It was a minor development that had no bearing on the matter at hand yet it buttressed his judgment of Honcho. The neuter was a tortured creature and sex was going to be the death of him. He was reaching for the unattainable and that was nearly always fatal.

Gravely he said: "Your ambition is impressive, Honcho. It is overwhelming. Not only do you wish to rule Tharn, you also wish to be a man. I can only advise you to be careful. Do not overreach."

Honcho stroked his sharp chin. "I thought you would say that You have changed, Blade. You have changed greatly since I destroyed Moyna and took you prisoner. Is it possible that I made a mistake sending you here as I did? I begin to think there is treachery in your heart, Blade. That you do not intend to carry out our plan, to keep our bargain."

Coldness grew in Blade. The neuter's tone was soft, lacking in anger, and laden with a mocking confidence that rattled the big man. He kept his face impassive.

"That may be, Honcho. Why do I need you now? I am accepted as Mazda. I rule. I have Isma. With every hour I learn more of Tharn and Urcit and the uses of the Power. What can you offer me, Honcho, that I do not already have? I command now, Honcho, not you! You are fortunate that I decided to forget your scheming and let you live in peace in the North Provo. You will, of course, have nothing more to do with the Pethcines. When I am ready I will destroy them." This last was said on impulse, on the spur of the moment. Blade felt a strange compulsion to keep talking, because as long as he talked Honcho would not, and he did not want Honcho to speak because he knew what Honcho was going to say. Blade did not want him to say it. Blade was trying to forget it. And her.

Honcho had folded his frail arms across his chest. He stood listening with bowed head, half smiling, his eyes half closed, the epitome of patience. Blade's hand itched for the great sword. If only Honcho was here in real and not simlu! Blade choked back a curse, feeling the sweat start on his forehead. It was useless to wish. You could not decapitate a simlu.

Honcho looked up. "You are quite finished?"

Blade nodded curtly. "I am. Go. I am weary and wish to rest Go back to your Provo, Honcho, and forget your plotting. I will forget that you ever plotted. That I promise."

Honcho's mouth thinned. "And leave you to gather all the fruits of my planning? I think not, Blade. Perhaps you are a fool after all. At the moment you are showing the intelligence of first level ceboid, a sweeper of dung. But you have a weakness, Blade, a great weakness that you try to pretend you do not have. No! Speak no more. Watch. I am going to show you something. I can only do this because old Sutha has weakened the magveils, trying to entice me into Urcit. Did you really think that I would teleport myself here, put my real in your power? Think again. When I come in my real it will be with Org and the Pethcines and as a conqueror. But watch, Blade. Watch!"

Honcho pointed a finger at the center of the chamber. Blade started, fascinated, knowing that it was taking every ounce of Honcho's power to summon a second simlu into the room. The neuter was using secondary power, regenerated and buffered in the Gorge Tower, though fed from the primary source, and from that distance the power was stretched to the ultimate.

Yet a picture was forming in the room. Blade watched with a coldness growing in him. It was Zulekia. And Totha.

Zulekia was somewhere in the Tower, in a barren room. She was spread-eagled on the floor, her arms and legs pulled wide apart and fastened to ringbolts of teksin. She was naked. She was screaming, her red mouth gaping wide, though Honcho was not bringing the sound into the chamber. Somehow that made it worse for Blade - the yawning contorted mouth that he had kissed - and the silent screaming that went on and on.

One of the ceboid-soldiers was atop Zulekia. It finished and another took its place. There was a long line of ceboids waiting outside the door, snarling and jostling and peering to see what was going on. The line stretched down a corridor and out of sight.

Totha watched from a corner of the room. She was smiling and laughing and applauding as each ceboid took a turn with the shrieking Zulekia. Blade hated her. His big fingers itched for her throat.

Totha went to kneel beside the Maiduke girl. Totha was wearing only a brief girdle of animal skin and her breasts hung firm and shapely as she bent over Zulekia.

Her lips writhed over sharp little teeth as she thrust a little flaying knife into tender flesh. Zulekia screamed with the new pain and began to thresh about in her agony. She arched her back, screaming and screaming.

Sweat was pouring from Blade. Isma stirred sleepily beside him but he paid her no heed. "Enough," he grated at Honcho. "Enough! I swear, by all the Gods of Tharn, that I will do the same to you..."

Honcho mocked him. "But watch - there is more."

The scene faded, then came back. This time Blade saw the Tower, the terrace on which he had first seen Zulekia, overhanging the Gorge. Four ceboids were holding the girl by the wrists and ankles, swinging her back and forth, on the point of hurling her into the Gorge. Totha stood a little way back, watching with her same cruel smile.

"I have been able to invent a little refinement," said Honcho. "The hooks. Watch carefully."

It was only simlu, yet Blade winced, sweated and cursed under his breath. Great jagged hooks of teksin had been set into the cliff wall. The falling body of Zulekia hurtled down and struck a pair of the hooks. They pierced her thighs and torso and she hung there like meat in the butcher shop, her once lovely face dissolved in agony, a contorted screaming mask.

"It will be," said Honcho, "many minikronos before she dies. Would you have this happen, Blade?"

Blade wiped sweat from his face and stared at the creature. He was tense with rage and desperate, sick, with impotence. There was, at the moment, nothing he could do.

The picture faded away.

"That was only simlu," said Honcho. "Fore-simlu. An extrapolation of what will be, Blade, if you do not obey my orders. I have shown you. So it will be. I cannot, at the moment, force you to obey. The girl is my only weapon. Perhaps you do not care what happens to her and in that case I will have to find another way. Only you know that. But I must also know. What of it, Blade?"

Blade closed his eyes for a moment. He did not, actually, trust himself not to leap and grapple with the simlu. And make a fool of himself as he had before.

Sweat beaded his brow and formed saltily in the crevices of his body. He found himself praying to a Deity that was not Tharnian. To someone he had nearly forgotten. He prayed not for courage. He had that in plenty. He prayed for wisdom, patience, for cunning to match that of Honcho.

Blade looked at the neuter. He nodded. "It must not happen to Zulekia. What do you want me to do?"

Honcho told him. Told him briefly and faded away. Blade lay brooding and staring at the now empty chamber. Beside him Isma stirred and began to awaken. Presently she looked over at Blade and reached to stroke his bearded cheek.

"What is it, Lord? You look troubled."

"It is nothing," he told her. "I had a bad dream. Something you would not understand, since Tharnians do not dream."

She moved over to nuzzle and kiss him. "You are happy in Tharn, my Lord. With me?"

"I am happy," Blade said miserably.

Isma began to stroke her breasts, a habit she had preparatory to coi. She leaned to kiss Blade again. "I would have you, Lord, before we attend the feast later. Then we confer with old Sutha?"

For a moment she left off her warming-up exercises. "We confer and confer, Lord, and nothing happens. What do you and Sutha plan to do about the Pethcines?"

Blade rolled away from her and off the bed. At the moment the thought of coi revolted him. He stalked out of the room, taking the big sword with him.

Over his shoulder he said, "I go to see Sutha now. You are right. The Pethcine question must be settled at once. At once!"

But how? What? The dilemma lay within himself. Honcho was a monster. A cunning monster that struck directly at Blade's weakness, that had unerringly found the flaw in Blade. Had somehow known it from the first. Blade was human, not just homid, and Honcho knew that. He should not have known it, but he did.

And yet, as Blade made his way through a maze of tunnels and corridors to the computer room, where he would meet Sutha, he told himself that the problem was easily enough resolved. All he had to do was forget Zulekia. What was the girl to him, after all? A few minutes of pleasure...What else?

All he had to do was leave her to the torture and he was again ahead of Honcho in the deadly game they played.

Could he?