Shining Steel

Chapter Five

“A faithful man shall abound with blessings: but he that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent."-Proverbs 28:20

By the time they had made their way through the broad paved square inside the gate and found an inn John had decided that Timothy had grossly understated the opulence of the town. He had never seen such colors and textures. Almost every woman he saw seemed to be wearing a new color-every shade of green, blue, and yellow he could imagine, and a handful of daring young things in pink. Even a few men wore colors, blues and dark greens, and those who did wear the more customary browns and grays often used shades he had not encountered anywhere else.

Strange green plants grew in tubs and windowboxes on every side, including some with brown-grey stalks that looked absurdly tall and thin; he saw no red plants anywhere, nor any of the more familiar green ones. Curtains hung in every window. A few rockers stood on porches, and as Timothy had said, every single one had a cushion-and some even had cushions on the back as well as the seat. Many were embroidered in vivid colors.

Strange plants, rich fabrics, new dyes, and incredible weaponry-John was more certain than ever that the People of Heaven were trading with other worlds. Where else could they get such things? Those tall plants were certainly nothing that had ever grown on Godsworld before.

The whole city was soft and decadent, he judged. What kind of warriors would men who sat on cushions make? Were it not for the weapons, he would have said Little St. Peter was ripe for plundering by men who still led the hard, clean life that God had intended men to live.

The guns on the towers were not the only firearms in sight; as Timothy had reported, many of the men wore pistols on their belts or had rifles slung on their shoulders. John wondered how much ammunition they actually had. He remembered the machine gun in Marshside and its feeder belt with almost three hundred rounds left, even after the wasteful spraying of the hillside during the battle; if the People of Heaven were trading with Earth or one of the other Satanic worlds, then they could probably get all the sulphur they would ever need to make more than enough gunpowder to provide every man in Little St. Peter with cartridges.

Were there any settled planets other than Godsworld that were not Satanic? John had never heard of any; he had been taught that all God's chosen people, the enlightened and saved, had come to Godsworld, leaving the other worlds to the multitudes of the damned. The People of Heaven could probably buy sulphur by the pound or even the hundredweight.

He reevaluated the town in that light; the people here could afford to be decadent. An open attack would be suicidal.

They found an inn readily enough, just beyond the market square inside the gates; the traditional banner hung above the open arch of the doorway, proclaiming “ST. PETER'S INN” at the top, the customary “ST. MATTHEW CHAPTER XXV VERSES 34-40” across the bottom, and “Zachariah Come-to-Grace, Prop.” in the lower right corner. A separate sign pointed the way to the stable entrance.

John lifted Miriam down from her saddle, then held all three horses while she straightened her walking skirt and removed the riding skirt. When she was fit to be seen he exchanged the reins for the riding skirt and folded it neatly, following along as she led the animals into the stableyard. A boy was waiting; John tossed him a coin and Miriam handed him the reins. John glanced at the baggage, then at the stableboy, then shrugged. Even among heretics there was honor, he supposed; the boy wouldn't steal anything. Or if he did, if anything was missing later, John would know who to blame.

Together, John and Miriam walked through the stableyard arch into St. Peter's Inn.

The interior was in keeping with the opulence of the streets; the stone walls were covered with bright banners, lace curtains adorned the windows, and pillows and cushions were everywhere. A clock hung over the hearth, the expensive variety with a red hand to measure seconds, and although the room was relatively quiet and the red hand moving, listen as he might, John could not hear any ticking.

Honor among heretics there might be, but he wondered how such a marvel could be in so public a place without being stolen. And the cushions, as well-surely a few of those would vanish each night!

A score or so of customers were scattered at half a dozen tables, talking and drinking quietly; they paid the newcomers no heed. A nearwood bar stood in one corner, a man behind it polishing a tankard; John saw no one else, so he crossed to the bar.

“What can I do for you, sir?” the barman asked, putting down his tankard and towel as John approached.

“Are you the proprietor?” John asked.

“No, sir, Mr. Grace is away at the Citadel of Heaven today, and he left me in charge. James Redeemed-from-Sin is my name."

“Joel Meek-Before-Christ,” John answered. They shook hands. “My wife and I are just in from North Dan, with a few yards of good woolens. We could use a meal and a room, but from the look of this place,” he swept his arm around to include the entire inn and perhaps the town beyond, “I'm not sure we can afford any."

“Your first time in Little St. Peter?"

“Yes."

“Quite a fine little place, isn't it? Don't worry, though; our prices are reasonable enough. We won't turn you away."

“We haven't had a successful trip; forgive my bluntness, but what's ‘reasonable'?"

“What currency?"

“True Worder dollars.” The money from any of the larger powers could turn up anywhere, so John saw no reason to hedge.

“Don't get those much here.” He pulled out a chart from beneath the bar and consulted it, while John admired the hard, gleaming finish on the countertop-he had never seen nearwood look like that-and read the little plaque on the wall behind the barman, “Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares, HEBREWS XIII.2."

“Ah!” the barman said. “Here it is! One hundred and fifty for the room and bed, thirty for sheeting. House menu for dinner, forty-five dollars. The conversion rate for Heavener credits is fifteen dollars to one credit, if you want anything else."

John was surprised; the prices were reasonable-in fact were slightly less than he would have expected to pay in New Nazareth. “You use Heavener credits here? I don't know them."

“The People of Heaven-Little St. Peter's in their protectorate now, ever since St. Peter itself was sacked by the Chosen of the Holy Ghost last year. Best thing that ever happened to us, joining the protectorate-it was the People of Heaven sold us all these fabrics, that clock, everything! Here, look at this bar!” He tapped the countertop.

“I was just looking at it a moment ago,” John said. “Never saw anything like it."

“It's plastic! Do you believe that? Pure plastic! And all they wanted for it was an even exchange in raw nearwood!"

“That's crazy,” Miriam said from behind John's shoulder.

“Isn't it? But they meant it, they did it! Traded even, no strings attached!"

“They want nearwood that much?"

“I guess they do! We've been swapping nearwood for everything you could imagine! Grain, too-I understand they'll pay top price for wheat, higher than anyone else around. And those woolens of yours-they've been buying raw wool, anyway. I'm not sure about fabrics; they've got enough of their own, it seems. Beef, leather, mutton, fungusmeat, fish, and if your little lady there's got nimble fingers, they even buy embroidery! The good Lord alone can know what they want with it all-begging your pardon, folks, my tongue ran away with me. It's been mighty good for the trade here, all this stuff coming through, and what's good for business is good for me-I'm paid on a share."

“What do they do with it all? And how do they pay for it?"

“I haven't the faintest idea what they do with it, sir, and that's the truth, but they pay in credits, and their credits are good, solid money, good for everything they sell-plastic is just one little thing. They sell fabrics I never heard of, so fine that you can't even see the weave and with textures like nothing on Godsworld-take a look at the curtains, you never saw anything like that in North Dan. Those cushions, too. And gunpowder-they must have found sulphur's Mother Lode itself. You saw those guns on the walls, I reckon-the Heaveners put those up themselves when Little St. Peter signed on. I tell you, joining the protectorate was the best thing the town elders ever did here. Jesus must surely love the People of Heaven!"

“I don't know,” John answered. “It might not be Jesus. Seems to me there's something sinful in all this wealth. Where'd it come from? It's a lure and a temptation, that's sure, but it's not Jesus who leads men into temptation."

The barman, who had been leaning forward over the bar, stood back, his tone suddenly unfriendly. “Now, sir, I'm not right certain that I take your meaning. Are you saying you see the hand of Satan in this?"

“No, I didn't say that-I don't know what I see. I do have my doubts, though. There's an old saying, that what's too good to be true isn't true, and it seems to me that all this wealth might be false, might have the hand of Satan behind it-but I can't say for sure. I'm just a trader in woolens, not a preacher."

“Well,” the barman said, his tone slightly more conciliatory, “I can see how one might wonder. But we do have our preachers here in Little St. Peter, and our doubters, too, and the preachers have answered the doubters. God has smiled on us, in reward for three hundred years of righteous living. If it were Satan's work, now, what Satan does is to tempt men into sin; and while we might've been tempted by the riches of Heaven here, there's been no sin, no one's lured us into evil. It's still honest work, cutting the nearwood or growing the wheat and trading it to the Heaveners, it just pays better than we're used to. The laborer is worthy of his hire, though-you know the Bible says that. The customs say to charge what the market will bear-and it's the Heaveners who set the prices, not us. Some of our folk have even told them, out of Christian charity, that they're paying too much, and they've changed a few of their prices, but they still pay well, because they say they want our trade and will pay high to keep it."

“But how did they get so rich? What if their wealth is the wages of sin, and you're sharing in it?"

“The wages of sin is death, friend. What sort of sin could it be that would bring wealth like this instead? No, what I think is that they've discovered the lost knowledge of the ancients-maybe they found the Mother Ship itself, as well as the Mother Lode. One of our scholars says that they might have found something called a ‘communication sat-in-light', or something akin to that-I didn't catch the words, but it's something that the ancients hung in the sky when they came that might have fallen since. It's a strange and wondrous thing, certainly, but it's a blessing, not a sin."

“Mr. Redeemed, I hope you won't take offense at this, but I wonder if perhaps they haven't been trading with sinners-trading with other worlds. Maybe with Earth itself."

The barman stared for a moment, then burst out laughing. John and Miriam simply watched until he had calmed down.

“Other worlds? Mister, have you heard the histories? Don't you know anything? First off, our ancestors came to Godsworld fleeing Armageddon, you know that-Earth was in its last days, and was surely destroyed long ago. And even if they escaped Armageddon as we did, the other worlds wouldn't have starships any more than we do here, now, would they? They were settled by sinners and fools-they're probably savages huddled around campfires cooking and eating each other."

“We can't be sure Earth…” John began.

“Mister, I wasn't finished,” Redeemed-from-Sin interrupted. “I didn't say my piece. The important thing is, that even if Earth is still there, even if the sinners and philistines still have starships, how far is it? It took our people one hundred and eleven years to cross the darkness to Godsworld! The scientists had to put them all to sleep, and the crewmen all died of old age on the way, leaving their sons to carry on until the folk were awakened. Now tell me, mister-you're a trader-what sort of a trade can you carry on when every voyage takes one hundred and eleven years each way? Would you come all that distance just for nearwood and wheat?” He shook his head. “Even if Earth is still there, we won't be hearing from them again."

John stopped and considered that argument. He had not thought about it before. He knew the legends of the Crossing, of course, and how the People had been put into plastic coffins and made to sleep for over a century, but he had failed to think through what that meant to his belief that the Heaveners were from another world. The People had come to Godsworld; why couldn't others? And of course, they could-but why should they? Not for trade, certainly, not if the journey took a double lifetime each way. Not even for conquest-unless they had been driven off Earth and had nowhere else to go.

That was foolish, though; the skies were filled with stars. Why pick Godsworld?

Perhaps Satan's empire had conquered all the rest, and was now after the only remaining bastion of righteousness; Satan was said to seek power and domination for its own sake, to hate all who opposed him. But even so, to send a conquering army out on a journey that would last centuries…

But would it? Maybe some way had been found of shortening the trip. John was no scholar; he knew that the original People had supposedly travelled as fast as it was ever possible to travel, but he had no idea what the limit was. Might they have been wrong about it? They had been wrong about other things-they had thought their children would live in perpetual peace and harmony, all Christians together, yet the heretics had split the congregation within three years of the Landing, and only now were the People of the True Word and Flesh beginning to see the possibility of reunification within their lifetimes.

No, that didn't seem reasonable. The bartender's explanation made more sense. John still thought, however, that there was something wrong about the entire situation, something warped and alien. Wealth appearing out of nowhere was acceptable-but for that wealth to be in gunpowder and plastic and other, less identifiable things, fabrics and strange plants and dyes, seemed threatening. A single find, however magnificent, should not produce them all.

If not Satan's people, perhaps Satan himself had decided to try new tactics on Godsworld. It was undoubtedly the Devil who had split apart the People and dragged most of the population down into heresy; perhaps he foresaw that the People of the True Word and Flesh, armed in righteousness, would soon bring the world back together if he did not find a new way to stop them. The wealth of the People of Heaven might come directly from Hell itself.

John had never believed that Satan intervened so directly in human affairs; he had always thought of the Devil, when he thought of the Devil at all, as working entirely through the hearts and minds of men. Perhaps he had been wrong.

The whole thing was a mystery, and John wanted to solve it. To do so, he knew he would need to get to the heart of it. Scouting out the military might of Little St. Peter was of only secondary importance. He had to find out who the People of Heaven truly were, and where they were getting their guns and wealth. To do that, he would need to see their homeplace.

He had to get to the Citadel of Heaven, that was the simple truth.

“You're right,” he agreed. “I hadn't thought about that, but of course you're right. Even if you made the trip asleep, the goods might not be worth anything by the time you got back."

“That's right,” the barman agreed, cheerful once again.

“That must be some find they made up there."

“I guess it must be, all right."

“I'd like to see if I can get a little of it for my woolens, then-what's the road to the Citadel like?"

The barman eyed him dubiously. “It's a mighty long walk, through some bad hill country-I don't know if horses could make it."

“But you said Mr. Grace is there, and the traders come and go…” John was honestly startled.

“They don't walk, though; they take the airship over the hills."

“Airship?” John was no longer merely startled, he was astonished. After a few seconds’ confusion, he asked, “Well, then, why can't we take this airship?"

“I didn't say you couldn't; you asked about the road, and where you were worried about prices before, I thought perhaps you couldn't afford the airship."

“Oh.” John was struggling to think about too many things at once. In the past hour he had seen weapons such as he had never imagined on the walls of an unimportant village, and wealth beyond believing-but had had his theory of offworld intervention severely damaged, leaving him with no good explanation for any of it. And now this innkeeper's assistant was calmly talking about an airship's fare as if it were an ordinary ferryboat. “How much is it?"

“Thirty credits."

“Thirty credits-oh.” Well, John told himself, at least ancient scientific miracles don't come cheap.

“That's each, if you take your wife-they don't let women ride free-and one way. Same prices coming back. No horses-you'll need to carry your packs yourself, or else pay another twenty credits to send them as freight."

“Oh,” John said again. He felt control of the situation slipping away from him, and grabbed it back. He had enough money-he had expected prices to be running rampant in Little St. Peter, and had brought enough for a three-week stay. He could not risk leaving Miriam behind, and the woolens would be needed to keep up his pose as a trader. That meant eighty credits each way. Eighty credits would be twelve hundred dollars; twelve hundred dollars each way would take a chunk out of his funds, but would be well worth it if it cleared up the mysteries once and for all and provided him with proof that the People of Heaven were the real threat to Godsworld. “When does it leave?” he asked.