The First Protector

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Ma'el Report. Day 112,293…

During the short stay in the laboratory which followed the visit to the Paramount Chief of the Algonquin Nation, and in spite of some nonsubtle questioning on my part, Declan did not elaborate on the plans for the future provision for his family and descendants. So far as I can detect he has not made further mention of it to Sinead, either. Normally he is not a secretive person, and I hope that he is formulating a plan and was not merely expressing a wish.

"Since neither of them require further training in ship handling or in the use of my other mechanisms, more time is being spent on discussions of this world's religious beliefs and philosophies. Both of them have keen and above all flexible minds that I enjoy seeing at work even though I do not always win the argument. But Declan's great bodily size and the monstrous long-axe he carries look strangely at odds with his growing aptitude as a debater.

"Except for the present visit to Cathay, I have decided that the constant revisiting of cities and cultures that are long familiar to me is no longer necessary for the conclusion of my report and may, in fact, be a psychological stratagem aimed at delaying its completion and the unwelcome recommendations to the Synod that it will contain.

'The present visit to the oldest and relatively most stable of this world's civilizations will be the last before the wagon is retrieved and I return to the Hibernian laboratory to complete the work that I was sent here to do."

–

They had long become accustomed to walking on each side and a few paces behind Ma'el, and it seemed to Declan that only the costumes of those around them were different. As the foreign servants of their master, the rough and unembellished clothing of Sinead and himself aroused no comment and had changed not at all apart from her having to return to the pretense of being a boy, but this was because no mere female, much less a foreign servant woman, would have been allowed within the richly draped and decorated resplendence of the inner audience chamber of His Celestial Majesty the Emperor of Cathay.

Ma'el's dress was not as elaborate or costly as that of the Emperor, and had he been guilty of committing such a blatant act of impoliteness as to compete with the other in the matter of finery, the remainder of his life would have been short indeed. Nevertheless, while he appeared as dowdy as everyone else in comparison to the godlike presence into which he had come, the old man made an impressive figure.

From his cylindrical, richly embroidered skullcap and full, silken robes to the jewelled slippers encasing his feet, he was arrayed in the quietly resplendent apparel of a Mandarin of the Osprey Rank. His hands, held loosely at waist level, were encased in metal-stiffened gloves whose fingers extended beyond the elbows on both sides. This was an indication that a highborn personage like himself would not allow his fingernails to be cut and was therefore incapable of performing any task with his hands and, in fact, required servants to feed, clothe, clean, and perform all of the necessary actions of a personal or intimate nature that his lofty rank forbade him doing for himself. Suspended from his neck and held in position on his breast by silken cords tied around the waist was the most important part of his apparel, a small brassard of gold.

Yellow was the color of the Imperial House. The brassard of precious yellow metal signified that its wearer was an important and trusted servant engaged on the personal and urgent work of the Emperor, that he should be offered no let or hindrance, and that he should be given all possible assistance in men, time, or material resources in his performance of that duty.

That brassard would have taken them in perfect safety from the eastern face of the Great Wall, across the mountains, rivers, forests, deserts, and the often-unruly people that lay between, to the Imperial Palace in Xian where they now stood. But Ma'el had decided, in the interests of saving time, to avoid those natural hazards by flying over them.

They walked slowly to within five paces of the high dais which bore the Imperial throne before Ma'el stopped, went down on his knees, and then prostrated himself, arms outstretched on the processional carpet while Sinead and Declan did likewise. The Emperor made a small, permissive gesture signifying that the old man should rise and come forward to speak, but not so his two servants. They remained motionless and face down, for any movement might have been considered a threat to the Emperor, and the six massive and heavily armed statues ranged on each side of the Imperial throne, whose watchful eyes were the only parts of their bodies that seemed to move, would have come violently to life and killed them instantly.

Speaking in a soft voice which nevertheless seemed to reach every part of the audience chamber, Ma'el began to relate a fable which began and ended with a lie while the remainder contained the truth.

"Your Celestial Majesty," he said, "I am Ma'el. My father's father was given a task to perform by the former Emperor in the uncivilized lands beyond your western border. It was a mission of great political delicacy about which I would not wish to commit the impropriety of speaking in public, for at the time only the then Emperor and his principal advisor knew of it. Regrettably, circumstances including his untimely death prevented my grandfather from returning in person. He did, however, entrust his eldest son with the secret and through him his eldest son, my unworthy self, to report to you that the mission was successfully accomplished. I am also bound to return the symbol of Imperial trust and to renounce the high rank conferred on my grandfather, for I have no right to either."

There was silence for a moment, then the prostrate Declan heard the soft sound of slippers approaching and stopping beside Ma'el, a polite exchange of words as the brassard was removed and then the light clink and scrape of metal as it was placed on the lowest step of the Imperial dais. Only then did the Emperor speak.

"The personal loyalty to my illustrious predecessor," he said in a voice that was surprisingly strong to be coming from such a frail and ancient source, "that has been passed down to you in all its original strength is commendable. The symbol of office I shall reclaim but, in recognition and gratitude for your progenitor's services as well as your own exercise of discretion while returning it, the Order of a Mandarin of the Osprey Rank you shall retain for the remainder of your days. If there is anything else that you desire as a reward, be it riches, servants, a dwelling place commensurate with your position, or some other requirement, perhaps of a personal nature, you have but to name it. Rise. You have done well, Ma'el. You may speak."

Declan heard the soft rustle of the old man's silken robes as Ma'el rose to his feet and bowed low. "Your Celestial Majesty is most generous," he said, "but I neither need nor deserve material rewards for these poor services that have been done in the past. I am a man of learning, however, a philosopher, and some say a magician, who finds himself in your court, an establishment where knowledge of the natural sciences has been unsurpassed for thrice a thousand years and where true magic abounds. I would welcome a chance to spend some time among your great philosophers, and to speak with and learn from them. This, Great Emperor, is the only favor I ask."

There was a short silence, and when he replied the Emperor's voice sounded disinterested to the point of boredom.

"It is yours."

Thereafter Sinead and Declan were allowed to accompany Ma'el when his investigations took him into the hilly countryside outside the palace or during the night when, as palace custom dictated, his personal servant and his guardian were expected to sleep on the floor outside his chamber. At all other times, and provided they remained in the servants' area, they were free to go where they pleased because the self-acknowledged greatest minds in the world who occupied the Imperial College of Xian Palace would have found their presence a distraction during the weighty deliberations that were taking place there, and the old man had assured them that the assassination of a foreign visitor so soon after arrival, particularly when he had yet to reveal any useful information regarding the nations beyond the western wall, would have been considered a great waste as well as a grave impoliteness.

Forbidden the company of the great thinkers, they explored the rabbit warren of low-ceilinged service tunnels reeking of lamp oil and the even more smelly and horrendously overcrowded quarters of the thousands of slaves who were forbidden to show themselves unless something was required of them, and there they learned much. They did it by turning off their translator collars, pretending that they could speak only in their native Gaelic and proving it by making many ridiculous and often humorous mistakes. But they used their earpieces to listen to the conversations of senior slaves that the speakers thought were private, and in this fashion they were able to learn more than Ma'el. But the old man had recently taken to inviting the learned and venerable Hsung Hwa, who had the finest intellect as well as being the most entertaining of his Xianese mentors, to his quarters every evening. As a result the first chance Declan had to tell him of what he and Sinead had learned was when they were outside the palace in the late afternoon of the next day, where Ma'el was to be entertained to a demonstration of kite flying and, after dark, a display of pyrotechnics.

Hsung Hwa's silk-tented chair carried by six of his servants was about twenty paces ahead, and Declan had to make a great effort of will not to arouse the suspicions of Ma'el's bearers by dropping his voice when he spoke.

"Please listen carefully, Ma'el," he said. "I have no factual information, merely the overheard gossip of highly placed servants, but the talk is that you have aroused the suspicions of the Emperor. It is said that you appeared suddenly at night outside the palace gates, and try as they will, his countrywide army of Imperial spies is unable to uncover any evidence of your journey here. To him this means that your journey was undertaken in secret, that your progress was concealed by enemies wishing to overthrow the Emperor, and that your sudden appearance means that an uprising is imminent. It is rumored that you are shortly to be taken, tortured for whatever seditious information you possess, and killed. Sinead and I are unlikely to be spared. I strongly advise that we leave here without delay."

With a thoughtful inclination of his head, the old man said, "I expected that something like this was being planned for me, but not so soon. My work here is complete and there is no excuse for extending my stay other than intellectual pleasure, so I shall take your advice. The display of pyrotechnics is something you will not see elsewhere on your world, and I would not want either of you to miss it. I do not believe that I am in any immediate danger because the Emperor thinks it would be impossible for me to escape him. But if it will ease your minds, during our return to the palace this evening, I shall make an excuse to detach myself from Hsung Hwa, and you, Declan, can stand guard while Sinead brings our vessel down from orbit."

Declan was glad that Ma'el had insisted on delaying their departure until after nightfall because the kite flying was a truly wondrous sight. Many of them were box kites whose silken sides bore brightly painted designs which, according to the old man, had a religious significance. Others took the form of outsized birds with wings permanently outspread, or giant bats or flying dragons. One of them looked like the shadow monster that Sinead had made with her hands to frighten off the sea raiders off Finisterre at what now seemed to be a long time ago. They looked particularly beautiful when the last rays of the setting sun lit them against the darkening sky. As the highest of them were overtaken by the deepening twilight, a series of sharp, closely spaced detonations dragged their eyes groundward to the lower slopes of their hill where fountains of stars in a dazzling variety of colors were bursting upward into the heavens. A thunderclap accompanied every star burst.

Declan found it difficult to take his eyes off them, but fortunately, not impossible.

"Look there," he said urgently, pointing behind them. "Men with swords, eight, no, nine of them, coming out of the darkness above the shoulder of the hill. They probably expect us to be dazzled by the fireworks and unable to see them. Ma'el, we need the space vehicle, now!"

Hsung Hwa, who had been standing beside Ma'el, turned his head to follow the direction of Declan's pointing finger. The sight of the approaching men did not seem to surprise him, for he turned away without a word and, quickly for one of his advanced years, hobbled back to his carriage shouting orders to his slaves as he came. In a moment they were running down the slope. Ma'el's bearers, who had already abandoned their vehicle, were racing after them.

Sinead looked at the men advancing toward them, the light from the fireworks reflecting like stars off their swords.

"Ma'el," she said quickly, "we need your vessel to make a transdimensional jump, there's no time to bring it down through normal space. Do you want to do it?"

Ma'el replied by withdrawing the chart and the remote-control screen from his cloak and tossing them to the ground where they were already unfolding for use. He said, "Your digits are smaller and faster than mine."

Slowly and with the confidence of their greater numbers the men advanced in line abreast, swords carried across their chests. It was too dark to see their feet, but Declan felt sure that they were marching in step. Each end of the line was curving forward into a crescent formation, the obvious intention being to encircle their victims. Knowing that was not a tactically desirable situation when there was only one defender trying to protect three, he sprinted toward the center of the line with his long-axe swinging in wide circles around his head.

They heard him coming, but now it was their eyes that were being dazzled by the fireworks display behind him while his had grown accustomed to the darkness. His first blow knocked away his opponent's weapon and, judging by the sound he made, smashed the other's sword arm as well. He continued the swing toward the next man in line, who tried to turn away and received the axe blade in the small of the back. That one dropped to the ground, immobilized by legs that would no longer work. Of the six that were left, four moved out of range of his weapon intending to encircle him while the other two began running toward Sinead and Ma'el.

Those two had to be stopped.

It took a moment and several prodigious swings of his axe to break away from the four, and Declan was still several paces behind them when one of the two men grasped Ma'el by the cowl, baring his head and bringing the sword point to his throat, obviously intent on a capture and the extraction of information rather than a quick killing. Sinead was on her knees and looking down intently with both hands moving over the remote-control screen. The other man was closing on her with his weapon raised high to bring it down on the back of her neck.

For an instant, a terrible fear took Declan as he thought of that small, beautiful body he loved being converted into bloody dead meat, with her bright, agile mind and healing skills that together had labored and coaxed and nagged and finally loved him back to life gone forever, and with them their unborn child. Unable to control his feelings, he filled his lungs and emptied them with a sound, part scream of anger and pain at her expected loss and part bellow of sheer rage so loud and terrible that it frightened even himself. The men attacking Sinead and Ma'el froze at the sound, giving him a chance to get close before both turned to look at him. It was the last thing that they would ever do because by then his axe was already sweeping toward them in a wide, transverse swing that made a bloody end to both of them.

'This is difficult enough as it is," said Sinead irritably, her attention still on her rapidly moving hands, "without you getting blood all over my control screen. Can't you move the fight away?"

'Thank you, Declan," said Ma'el quietly, and went on, "Sinead, nullify the sound attenuators. When you bring the craft in, it must make much more noise than the fireworks."

Declan moved clear of them and the four remaining soldiers followed him, knowing that they would have to bring him down before they could risk attacking the other two. They circled him cautiously beyond the radius of his rapidly swinging weapon, occasionally jumping forward to try to stab him in the side or back as the axe head whistled past. He countered that by leaping forward, too, and shortening the distance to the attackers in front who retreated. Then one of them, plainly impatient with a game that nobody was going to win, moved back several paces. Grasping his blade at the weapon's center of balance, he hurled it spearlike at Declan's. The Hibernian dropped to his knees quickly and the blade glanced off his shoulder, opening a long cut in his forehead, eyebrow, and cheek as it spun away. Blood was running into one eye, partially blinding him, but he was able to see the thrown sword lying nearby. Still swinging the axe he rose to stand over it, knowing that while it was at his feet there were only three men with swords to contend with.

He swore as he saw the fourth man with what looked like a short knife in his hand moving toward Sinead and Ma'el, but he was too far away and too busy with the other three to do anything about it.

Suddenly the hillside was lit by an intense blue light and there was a deafening, hissing scream as the space vessel emerged from its dimensional jump almost on top of them, bleaching out the light of the fireworks and reducing their thunder to a low grumble. For a moment the four remaining attackers stood paralyzed by fear so that he could have slain them easily, but instead he watched them run screaming down the hill while Sinead brought the vessel into a gentle but incredibly noisy landing. Carefully, she folded and put away the chart and remote-control screen and followed Ma'el into the vessel with Declan close on her heels. The soundproof seal hissed shut behind them and they could hear themselves think again.

"Declan, you're wounded," Sinead said in an angry, concerned voice. "That eye… Let me look at that eye before we lift off…"

"Not yet," he said, and pointed through the forward screen into the valley where the fireworks display had ceased and the only lights visible were a few bobbing torches that were being carried by members of the fleeing crowd. Reassuringly, he went on, "My eye isn't damaged, just bloody, the cuts are above and below it. So first I want you to take us down there so that I can steal some of their abandoned fireworks. I might have a use for them…"