The Dragon Masters

Chapter 2

Ten miles from Banbeck Vale, across a wind-scoured wilderness of ridges, crags, spines of stone, amazing crevasses, barren fells and fields of tumbled boulders lay Happy Valley. As wide as Banbeck Vale but only half as long and half as deep, its bed of wind-deposited soil was only half as thick and correspondingly less productive.

The chief councilor of Happy Valley was Ervis Carcolo, a thick-bodied, short-legged man with a vehement face, a heavy mouth, a disposition by turns jocose and wrathful. Unlike Joaz Banbeck, Carcolo enjoyed nothing more than his visits to the dragon barracks, where he treated dragon masters, grooms and dragons alike to a spate of bawled criticism, exhortation, invective.

Ervis Carcolo was an energetic man, intent upon restoring Happy Valley to the ascendancy it had enjoyed some twelve generations before. During these harsh times, before the advent of the dragons, men fought their own battles, and the men of Happy Valley had been notably daring, deft and ruthless. Banbeck Vale, the Great Northern Rift, Clewhaven, Sadro Valley, and Phosphor Gulch all acknowledged the authority of the Carcolos.

Then down from space came a ship of the Basics, or grephs, as they were known at that time. The ship killed or took prisoner the entire population of Clewhaven; attempted as much in the Great Northern Rift, but only partially succeeded; then bombarded the remaining settlements with explosive pellets. When the survivors crept back to their devastated valleys, the dominance of Happy Valley was a fiction. A generation later, during the Age of Wet Iron, even the fiction collapsed. In a climactic battle Goss Carcolo was captured by Kergan Banbeck and forced to emasculate himself with his own knife.

Five years of peace elapsed, and then the Basics returned. After depopulating Sadro Valley, the great black ship landed in Banbeck Vale, but the inhabitants had taken warning and had fled into the mountains. Toward nightfall twenty-three of the Basics sallied forth behind their precisely trained warriors. There were several platoons of Heavy Troops, a squad of Weaponeers—these hardly distinguishable from the men of Aerlith—and a squad of Trackers. These later were emphatically different. The sunset storm broke over the Vale, rendering the fliers from the ship useless, which allowed Kergan Banbeck to perform the amazing feat which made his name a legend on Aerlith. Rather than joining the terrified flight of his people to the High Jambles, he assembled sixty warriors, shamed them to courage with jeers and taunts.

Leaping from ambush they hacked to pieces one platoon of the Heavy Troops, routed the others, captured the twenty-three Basics almost before they realized that anything was amiss. The Weaponeers stood back frantic with frustration, unable to use their weapons for fear of destroying their masters. The Heavy Troopers blundered forward to attack, halting only when Kergan Banbeck would be the first to die. Confused, the Heavy Troopers drew back; Kergan Banbeck, his men and the twenty-three captives escaped into the darkness.

The long Aerlith night passed; the dawn storm swept out of the east, thundered overhead, retreated majestically into the west; Skene rose like a blazing stom. Three men emerged from the Basic ship—a Weaponeer and a pair of Trackers. They climbed the cliffs to Banbeck Verge, while above flitted a small Basic flier, no more than a buoyant platform, diving and veering in the wind like a poorly-balanced kite. The three men trudged south toward the High Jambles, a region of chaotic shadows and lights, splintered rock and fallen crags, boulders heaped on boulders. It was the traditional refuge of hunted men.

Halting in front of the Jambles the Weaponeer called out for Kergan Banbeck, asking him to parley.

Kergan Banbeck came forth, and now ensued the strangest colloquy in the history of Aerlith. The Weaponeer spoke the language of men with difficulty, his lips, tongue and glottal passages more adapted to the language of the Basics.

“You are restraining twenty-three of our Reverend. It is necessary that you usher them forth, in all humility.” He spoke soberly, with an air of gentle melancholy, neither asserting commanding, nor urging. As his linguistic habits had been shaped to Basic patterns, so with his mental processes.

Kergan Banbeck, a tall spare man with varnished black eyebrows, black hair shaped and varnished into a crest of five tall spikes, gave a bark of humorless laughter. “What of the Aerlith folk killed? What of the folk seized aboard your ship?”

The Weaponeer bent forward earnestly, himself an impressive man with a noble aquiline head. He was hairless except for small rolls of wispy yellow fleece. His skin shone as if burnished; his ears, where he differed most noticeably from the unadapted men of Aerlith, were small fragile flaps.

He wore a simple garment of dark blue and white, carried no weapons save a small multi-purpose ejector. With complete poise and quiet reasonableness he responded to Kergan Banbeck’s questions. “The Aerlith folk who have been killed are dead. Those aboard the ship will be merged into the under-stratum, where the infusion of fresh outside blood is of value.”

Kergan Banbeck inspected the Weaponeer with contemptuous deliberation. In some respects, thought Kergan Banbeck, this modified and carefully inbred man resembled the sacerdotes of his own planet, notably in the clear fair skin, the strongly modeled features, the long legs and arms. Perhaps telepathy was at work, or perhaps a trace of the characteristic sour-sweet odor had been carried to him. Turning his head he noticed a sacerdote standing among the rocks not fifty feet away—a man naked except for his golden torc and long brown hair blowing behind him like a pennant. By the ancient etiquette, Kergan Banbeck looked through him, pretended that he had no existence. The Weaponeer after a swift glance did likewise.

“I demand that you release the folk of Aerlith from your ship,” said Kergan Banbeck in a flat voice.

The Weaponeer smilingly shook his head, bent his best efforts to the task of making himself intelligible. “These persons are not under discussion; their—” he paused, seeking words, “—their destiny is … parceled, quantum-type, ordained. Established. Nothing can be said more.”

Kergan Banbeck’s smile became a cynical grimace. He stood aloof and silent while the Weaponeer croaked on. The sacerdote came slowly forward, a few steps at a time. “You will understand,” said the Weaponeer, “that a pattern for events exists. It is the function of such as myself to shape events so that they will fit the pattern.” He bent, with a graceful sweep of arm seized a small jagged pebble. “Just as I can grind this bit of rock to fit a round aperture.”

Kergan Banbeck reached forward, took the pebble, tossed it high over the tumbled boulders. “That bit of rock you shall never shape to fit a round hole.”

The Weaponeer shook his head in mild deprecation. “There is always more rock.”

“And there are always more holes,” declared Kergan Banbeck.

“To business then,” said the Weaponeer. “I propose to shape this situation to its correct arrangement.”

“What do you offer in exchange for the twenty-three grephs?”

The Weaponeer gave his shoulder an uneasy shake. The ideas of this man were as wild, barbaric and arbitrary as the varnished spikes of his hairdress. “If you desire I will give you instruction and advice, so that—”

Kergan Banbeck made a sudden gesture. “I make three conditions.” The sacerdote now stood only ten feet away, face blind, gaze vague. “First,” said Kergan Banbeck, “a guarantee against future attacks upon the men of Aerlith. Five grephs must always remain in our custody as hostages. Secondly—further to secure the perpetual validity of the guarantee—you must deliver me a spaceship, equipped, energized, armed, and you must instruct me in its use.”

The Weaponeer threw back his head, made a series of bleating sounds through his nose. “Thirdly,” continued Kergan Banbeck, “you must release all the men and women presently aboard your ship.”

The Weaponeer blinked, spoke rapid hoarse words of amazement to the Trackers. They stirred, uneasy and impatient, watching Kergan Banbeck sidelong as if he were not only savage, but mad. Overhead hovered the flier; the Weaponeer looked up and seemed to derive encouragement from the sight. Turning back to Kergan Banbeck with a firm fresh attitude, he spoke as if the previous interchange had never occurred. “I have come to instruct you that the twenty-three Revered must be instantly released.”

Kergan Banbeck repeated his own demands. “You must furnish me a spaceship, you must raid no more, you must release the captives. Do you agree, yes or no?”

The Weaponeer seemed confused. “This is a peculiar situation—indefinite, unquantizable.”

“Can you not understand me?” barked Kergan Banbeck in exasperation. He glanced at the sacerdote, an act of questionable decorum, then performed in manner completely unconventional. “Sacerdote, how can I deal with this blockhead? He does not seem to hear me.”

The sacerdote moved a step nearer, his face as bland and blank as before. Living by a doctrine which proscribed active or intentional interference in the affairs of other men, he could make to any question only a specific and limited answer. “He hears you, but there is no meeting of ideas between you. His thought-structure is derived from that of his masters, and is incommensurable with yours. As to how you must deal with him, I cannot say.”

Kergan Banbeck looked back to the Weaponeer. “Have you heard what I asked of you? Did you understand my conditions for the release of the grephs?”

“I heard you distinctly,” replied the Weaponeer. “Your words have no meaning, they are absurdities, paradoxes. Listen to me carefully. It is ordained, complete, a quantum of destiny, that you deliver to us the Revered. It is irregular, it is not ordainment that you should have a ship, or that your other demands be met.”

Kergan Banbeck’s face became red; he half-turned toward his men, but restraining his anger, spoke slowly and with careful clarity. “I have something you want. You have something I want. Let us trade.”

For twenty seconds the two men stared eye to eye. Then the Weaponeer drew a deep breath. “I will explain in your words, so that you will comprehend. Certainties—no, not certainties; definites—definites exist. These are units of certainty, quanta of necessity and order. Existence is the steady succession of these units, one after the other. The activity of the universe can be expressed by reference to these units. Irregularity, absurdity—these are like half a man, with half a brain, half a heart, half of all his vital organs. Neither are allowed to exist. That you hold twenty-three Revered as captives is such an absurdity, an outrage to the rational flow of the universe.”

Kergan Banbeck threw up his hands, turned once more to the sacerdote. “How can I halt his nonsense? How can I make him see reason?”

The sacerdote reflected. “He speaks not nonsense, but rather a language you fail to understand. You can make him understand your language by erasing all knowledge and training from his mind, and replacing it with patterns of your own.”

Kergan Banbeck fought back an unsettling sense of frustration and unreality. In order to elicit exact answers from a sacerdote, an exact question was required; indeed it was remarkable that this sacerdote stayed to be questioned. Thinking carefully, he asked, “How do you suggest that I deal with this man?”

“Release the twenty-three grephs.” The sacerdote touched the twin knobs at the front of his golden torc: a ritual gesture indicating that, no matter how reluctantly, he had performed an act which conceivably might alter the course of the future. Again he tapped his torc, and intoned, “Release the grephs; he will then depart.”

Kergan Banbeck cried out in unrestrained anger. “Who then do you serve? Man or greph? Let us have the truth! Speak!”

“By my faith, by my creed, by the truth of my tand I serve no one but myself.” The sacerdote turned his face toward the great crag of Mount Gethron and moved slowly off; the wind blew his long fine hair to the side.

Kergan Banbeck watched him go, then with cold decisiveness turned back to the Weaponeer. “Your discussion of certainties and absurdities is interesting. I feel that you have confused the two. Here is certainty from my viewpoint! I will not release the twenty-three grephs unless you meet my terms. If you attack us further, I will cut them in half, to illustrate and realize your figure of speech, and perhaps convince you that absurdities are possible. I say no more.”

The Weaponeer shook his head slowly, pityingly. “Listen, I will explain. Certain conditions are unthinkable, they are unquantized, un-destined—

“Go,” thundered Kergan Banbeck. “Otherwise you will join your twenty-three revered grephs, and I will teach you how real the unthinkable can become!”

The Weaponeer and the two Trackers, croaking and muttering, turned, retreated from the Jambles to Banbeck Verge, descended into the valley. Over them the flier darted, veered, fluttered, settled like a falling leaf.

Watching their retreat among the crags the men of Banbeck Vale presently witnessed a remarkable scene. Half an hour after the Weaponeer had returned to the ship, he came leaping forth once again, dancing, cavorting. Others followed him—Weaponeers, Trackers, Heavy Troopers and eight more grephs—all jerking, jumping, running back and forth in distracted steps. The ports of the ship flashed lights of various colors, and there came a slow rising sound of tortured machinery.

“They have gone mad!” muttered Kergan Banbeck. He hesitated an instant, then gave an order. “Assemble every man; we attack while they are helpless!”

Down from the High Jambles rushed the men of Banbeck Vale. As they descended the cliffs, a few of the captured men and women from Sadro Valley came timidly forth from the ship and meeting no restraint fled to freedom across Banbeck Vale. Others followed—and now the Banbeck warriors reached the valley floor.

Beside the ship the insanity had quieted; the out-worlders huddled quietly beside the hull. There came a sudden mind-shattering explosion; a blankness of yellow and white fire. The ship disintegrated. A great crater marred the valley floor; fragments of metal began to fall among the attacking Banbeck warriors.

Kergan Banbeck stared at the scene of destruction. Slowly, his shoulders sagging, he summoned his people and led them back to their ruined valley. At the rear, marching single-file, tied together with ropes, came the twenty-three grephs, dull-eyed, pliant, already remote from their previous existence. The texture of Destiny was inevitable: the present circumstances could not apply to twenty-three of the Revered. The mechanism must therefore adjust to insure the halcyon progression of events. The twenty-three, hence, were something Other than the Revered: a different order of creature entirely. If this were true, what were they? Asking each other the question in sad croaking undertones, they marched down the cliff into Banbeck Vale.