The Quillian Sector

Chapter Five

On Ellge, they picked up a dancer, a woman of fading beauty with a heavily painted face, hands which held the likeness of claws, eyes the bleakness of glass. A creature long past her prime, now moving to worlds of lesser competition. Those with a cruder appreciation of her art, on which she could still earn a living and, perhaps, find a man to support her to the end of her days.

On Vhenga, they took on a dispenser of charms; a thin-faced man with an embroidered cloak and a box filled with strange nostrums and exotic ointments. The dancer stayed on, finding a kindred soul in the seller of charms, spending long hours huddled with him over the gaming table in the salon, where she played her cards as if they were pieces of her own flesh.

On Cheen, they were joined by two dour engineers, a time-served contract man from the mines and a minor historian from the Institute.

On Varge, they took on a professional dealer in items of death.

Like the dispenser of charms, he was tall, thin-faced, sparse in body, but where Fele Roster had crinkles in the corners of his eyes and a wry smile wreathing his lips, thin though they might be, Shan Threnond's face was a mask from which he looked with cynical indifference on a universe he had taken no part in making, and which he understood all too well.

A man of business, who wasted no time in setting up his trade in the salon, unwilling to waste a moment as the Entil hurtled through the void, wrapped in the humming, space-eating power of its Erhaft drive.

"Here we have a small item which must hold interest for all who value the safety of their skins," he murmured as, with deft hands, he set out his wares on the rich darkness of a velvet cloth. "In the shape of a ring, as you see, and the stone and mounting are of intrinsic value. But note, the stone is drilled and contains three darts, each of which can be fired by a simple contraction of the muscle. The stone can be removed and recharged so as to allow practice. Observe." He slipped the ring on a finger, aimed it at a scrap of board, lowered the appendage at the second joint. Those watching heard a barely audible spat and, on the board, a thing shrilled with vicious life. Almost immediately, it created an area of disintegration around it; a pit which dribbled a fine dust and from which, finally, it fell.

"The harmonics are destructive to all organic matter," said the dealer quietly. "The area affected is half as deep as it is wide. In flesh there are toxic side effects. The shock-impact is vast, the pain is great and, aimed at the throat, death is certain."

"Unless the dart is quickly removed?"

"Yes." Shan Threnond glanced at the dancer. "You know of these things, madam?"

She ignored the stilted courtesy. "I've seen them before. And, on Heldha, I saw a man whipped to the edge of death for owning such a thing."

"A backward world, my lady."

"A logical one." One of the engineers rasped a hand over his chin. "They don't like assassins."

"Does anyone?" Threnond lifted his shoulders in a shrug. "But a man must protect himself. Surely you would not deny anyone that right? And a woman must take elementary precautions against those who would do her harm. You, my lady, must have had experience of such dangers. At least, felt at times the need to reduce the pressure of an unwanted passion, shall we say? This will do exactly that." He lifted another item from his store. "A ring again-but what better place to carry a weapon than on a finger? There it can remain, always in clear view, apparently harmless, yet ready for immediate action should the need arise. This contains a pressurized drug which can be blasted into a face. Within two seconds, the recipient will be stunned and helpless long enough for the user to escape, change the situation, or summon aid."

"A whore's device." Fele Roster shook his head in distaste. "No decent woman would ever allow herself to become involved in the kind of situation you mention."

"You talk like a fool," snapped the dancer. "Decency has nothing to do with it. How much?"

"For the ring? In gold, with a genuine ruby, three hundred urus. With a synthetic gem, a hundred less. For paste and gilt, a hundred-the cost of the inner mechanism and charge must, of course, remain the same."

"I'll take a synthetic." The dancer pointed with a hooked finger. "That one. And another with the darts. How much for both?"

Later, lying beside him in the snug confines of his cabin, Dilys said, "Why did she buy such things, Earl? An old woman like that."

"She is afraid."

"And so arms herself? Against what?"

Against the terrors of the mind, which were often more frightening than those of reality. Against age itself, and imagined hunger. Against potential illness and poverty and neglect. Against threats she had known and dangers she had passed and could meet again. Like the scum they had met on Vult, and others who haunted the dark corners of primitive worlds.

Dilys said, after he'd explained, "Those rings won't give her much protection if she is attacked. She could miss, or the attacker could be armored, or there could be more than one. And the mere attempt to defend herself could anger them."

"So?"

She flushed, grasping his meaning, sensing his lack of sympathy with any who thought that way, or who imagined trouble could be avoided by the closing of eyes.

"Do you think I'm a coward, Earl?"

"No."

"But-?" She broke off as if waiting for an answer, and when none came, continued, "It's my size. Just because you're big, people think you must be hard and tough and aggressive, but it isn't like that at all. At least, not as far as I'm concerned. I hate violence, and always have. When I see it, I want to run away from it, and when I get mixed up in it, like on Vult, I-well, I just can't handle it. If that isn't being a coward, what is?"

"I don't know."

"Don't lie to me, Earl."

"I'm not." Dumarest turned to look at her in the soft, nacreous lighting. Moonglow touched her cheeks and shadowed her eyes, glimmered from the rich, full contours of her naked body, touched breasts and hips and the curve of thighs with creamy halations. "Cowardice is determined by other people on the basis of what they think someone else should have done in a particular situation. It's also a cheap term of abuse. What we're really talking about is survival. Sometimes, in order to survive, you have to kill. At other times, you have to run. If you try to kill and fail, then you aren't brave, you're dead. If you run and escape, you aren't a coward, you're alive."

"Black and white," she said. "You make it sound all so simple. Either a thing is or it isn't, but surely there are shades of gray? Possibilities in between?"

"A man is either alive or dead," said Dumarest. "How can there be degrees between? He can be crippled or ill or diseased, but those are degrees of efficiency, not of life. He is alive until he is dead."

"And to stay alive, sometimes he has to run." She turned her head to look at him, the helmet of hair catching and reflecting the light to make a golden haze framing the broad planes of her face. "Have you ever had to run, my darling?"

"Yes."

"From home?" She repeated the question wanting, womanlike, to know of his early days. "Did you run away from home in order to seek adventure?"

"To avoid starvation," he said bluntly. "I was little more than a boy and I stowed away on a ship. I was more than lucky-the captain could have evicted me. Instead, he allowed me to earn my passage. A long time ago, now. A long time."

Long enough to have moved deeper into the galaxy where suns glowed hot and close, and shipping was plentiful. Into a region where even the very name of Earth had become the subject of humor. A planet forgotten, but one which he had to find. Would find.

"Home," she said gently. "Earth is your home and you want to return. But why, Earl? If there was nothing for you there when you left, what can be waiting for you now?"

"Nothing."

"But-"

"You said it, Dilys. Home. A man can have only one."

A place to call his own. A world on which to settle and on which to make his mark. To build a house and raise a family, to find happiness and contentment. A dream, one born during the long, lonely journeys between the stars. An ideal nurtured to give a meaning to life, a reason for existing. A determination which drove him to find his world or die trying.

A waste! God, such a waste!

She felt his warmth close beside her, the comfort he gave, the sense of security she enjoyed when she was with him. A man of whom any woman could be proud. As she was proud when watching him at work in the salon, gambling with calm efficiency, apparently unaware of the stares thrown at him by women, the calculating appraisal of their eyes.

Could they sense the loneliness she had recognized? The bleak isolation in which he lived, the cold emptiness of life spent journeying from world to world, the frustration of an endless, hopeless search? And always a stranger among strangers, any liaison only temporary, any love doomed to wither, to fade, to die.

"Earl," she whispered, "don't you ever get tired? Don't you ever want to stop and settle down and live as most men do?" A question she waited in vain for him to answer. "I've some property on Swenna. It isn't much, a farm and enough ground to keep a dozen alive, but there is a river and the mountains are close and, at night during summer, the air is so sweet with perfume it can make you drunk. If you ever get tired, Earl, if you ever want a place to stay and rest and maybe relax awhile, it's yours. I'd be there, if you wanted me. And you wouldn't regret it, I swear to that." Her hand reached out to touch him, to glide in a possessive caress over his shoulder, his arm. "Think about it, darling. At least think about it."

In the shadows, something moved, a click and a portion of the chamber bloomed with variegated lights, the hologram seeming to hang suspended in the air, to have brought a literal section of space itself into the confined boundaries of the room.

"The Rift," said the technician, "As you ordered, my lord."

Caradoc said, "You are mistaken. I asked for a detailed display of the Quillian Sector."

"I-my apologies. A mistake. It will be corrected immediately."

And would never be repeated. A word, and the technician would be demoted, branded as an indifferent worker, denied access to the sophisticated equipment housed in the building of the Hafal-Glych-a slur on his reputation which he would never live down. And the word would be given. Cyber Caradoc had no time for carelessness and no patience where inefficiency was concerned. Now, as the display changed, he nodded and gestured dismissal. Only when alone did he step toward the shimmering profusion of multicolored lights and smoky blotches of roiling ebon which constituted the Quillian Sector.

A region of space overcrowded with suns, over-profuse with worlds, hyperactive with electronic forces. Energies which nullified the normal use of radio-even the high-beam transmitters operating at maximum power and negating the limitations of light were, at the best, erratic. An irritation and a danger, but steps had been taken and all was proceeding according to plan.

Soon, now, the man would be taken.

Soon, now, the long chase would be over and Dumarest would be held by the Cyclan to yield the secret he possessed and which they rightfully owned.

A step, and lights reflected their images on the taut features and the scarlet robe, little dots of blue and green, yellow and amber, violet and ruby-the latter lost against the fabric but showing like sores against the skin of Caradoc's face. A good analogy; the ruby points were planets on which humanoid life was impossible; worlds of reeking vapors, tormented volcanoes, boiling, acid seas, poisonous atmospheres.

The dots of other colors showed worlds and suns in various stages of development and activity.

The ebon blotches were the dust clouds which held the Quillian Sector as though in the palm of a close-cupped hand.

"Master." An acolyte had entered the room on silent feet. "A message from Edhal. The Belzdek reports negative."

So the woman had lied. Caradoc was not surprised; he had expected nothing less. Bochner could have been mistaken, or could have lied in turn for some devious reason of his own. A matter of small probability, but even though small, it existed and had to be taken into account. As all things had to be taken into account, each given a measure of relative importance and relevance, each set against all other available facts in order to arrive at an extrapolated prediction.

An exercise of a mind chosen and trained by the Cyclan, which judged intellectual ability to be prized above all else.

Again, Caradoc studied the glimmering display, mind active as he assessed various probabilities, traced various paths between the stars. Only when he had exhausted all applicable combinations did he step back and head toward the door leading to the small private room placed at his disposal by those who ran the Hafal-Glych for the combine's true owners.

"Total seal," said Caradoc. "I am not to be disturbed for any reason."

"Master." The acolyte bowed and moved to take up his position outside the door. His life would be spent in guarding it, should the need arise.

Within the room, Caradoc touched the wide bracelet banding his left wrist. Invisible energy streamed from it, creating a zone of force through which no electronic eye or ear could operate. An added precaution to ensure his absolute privacy, as was the curtained window and the locked and guarded door.

Taking his place on a narrow cot, Caradoc closed his eyes and concentrated on the Samatchazi formulae. Gradually, his senses blurred and lost their function. Had he opened his eyes he would have been blind. Isolated in the prison of his skull, his mind ceased to be irritated by external stimuli and by means of the self-induced sensory deprivation, became a thing of pure intellect; its reasoning awareness the only conscious link with life. Only then did the engrafted Homochon elements become roused from quiescence. Rapport was soon established.

Caradoc took on a new dimension of life.

It was as if his mind had expanded to become a shimmering bubble which drifted among a host of other bubbles, all resplendent in variegated colors. A universe filled with glowing beauty which merged and wended one against the other to swirl and adopt new and ever-changing patterns of mathematical symmetry. Light which burned away the darkness of ignorance. Colors which expanded the visual spectrum. Form which held content. Content which held truth. Truth fashioned in a web which spanned the universe of which he was a living, active part. A part even as, at the same time, he was the whole. A bubble among other bubbles which were one bubble reflected to infinity.

At the heart of the shimmering beauty, at the very epicenter of the shifting patterns, rested the headquarters of the Cyclan. Buried far beneath the surface of a remote world, the central intelligence absorbed his knowledge as a desert absorbs water. A mental communication of almost instantaneous transference against which mechanical means of supralight contact were the merest crawl.

A moment, and then it was over.

The rest was sheer enjoyment, a mental intoxication which flooded his being and filled his brain with dancing motes of euphoric delight. Always was this period after rapport during which the Homochon elements sank back into quiescence and the machinery of his body began to realign itself with mental harmony. Caradoc floated in an ebon nothingness while he experienced strange, unlived situations, scraps of memory, fragments of exotic experiences, memories filled with outr? images-the residue of other intelligences, the overflow of other minds.

It came from the aura surrounding the tremendous installation of central intelligence, the radiated power of the great cybernetic complex which was the heart of the Cyclan. One day, he would be a part of that installation. His body would age and fail but his brain would be saved, removed from his skull and joined in series with the millions of other brains taken from cybers who had lived before him and now continued to live as disembodied brains in vats of nutrient fluid. He would live as they lived, totally divorced from the irking irritations of the body, able to concentrate on matters of pure thought. A time of endless tranquility in which he and they would work to solve each and every problem of the galaxy.

The reward of every cyber, but one which would be denied to him should he fail.

Opening his eyes, Caradoc stared at the ceiling, waiting for his motor functions to reach optimum before rising from the couch. A touch, and the bracelet was deactivated. The acolyte bowed as he left the room and entered the chamber to stand once again before the display.

"Master?"

The acolyte was bold, but Caradoc could appreciate his interest. And no potential cyber could be other than proudly alert-a trait to be encouraged as long as that pride did not usurp respect.

He said, "Verification of the report from the Belzdek. Negative as stated. The Wilke and the Ychale have been eliminated." Reports from cybers fed through central intelligence and passed on directly to his brain. Another report which he did not mention and an urgency about which he would think later.

"Which leaves the Entil and the Frame, master."

"Both traders and both operating in the Quillian Sector." Caradoc looked at the acolyte. It was never too soon to test the desired ability, and never a mistake to encourage its development. Practice in extrapolation, as in so many other things, led to perfection. "Your conclusions?"

For a moment the youth hesitated, then made his decision. "The Entil master."

A guess? If so, the habit must be eliminated. If not, the steps leading to the deduction could be elucidated.

"Explain."

"Both vessels are traders, master, but the Frame headed initially for Pontia. From there, it would be logical for it to make for Ninik, and then on to Swenna."

"Why?"

"The relative values of available cargoes. Pontia is a producer of leathers, oils, furs and feathers, articles of bone, concentrates of glandular excretions. There is a market for such things on Ninik. There, a cargo of tools and electronic components could be bought for sale on Swenna."

"Which is mostly an agricultural world." Caradoc nodded. The reasoning had been sound, but it betrayed a simplistic grasp of the essential elements of the situation. "And from Swenna, the Frame would have headed outward to the edge of the Quillian Sector? Correct?"

"Yes, master."

"Unless, of course, a cargo of high value was offered for immediate transport to a different world than those which you mentioned. Or a group of passengers bought a charter. Or the captain, because of some intuition, made a diversion. Or a local electronic storm forced the navigator to change course." Or that Dumarest, and the luck riding with him, had, by his mere presence, altered the natural sequence of logical events and introduced a "wild" factor, as he seemed to have done so often before; a thing Caradoc didn't mention. Instead he continued, "You appreciate how the most obvious pattern can be distorted by the smallest of unexpected events. Such events must always be included in any prediction you may make. In this case, however, you are correct. Dumarest is not on the Frame."

And had never been on it-a fact he had gained from his recent contact with central intelligence. Which meant that unless he had left the vessel, Dumarest must still be on the Entil.

Caradoc took a step closer to the shimmering display. Somewhere among the suns, the dots representing the ship would be moving, halting at worlds which he saw only as minute flecks of color. Short journeys, some taking only a few subjective hours. Short stopovers-no trader made a profit by hugging dirt. Destinations determined by the availability of cargoes or the needs of paying passengers. The ship moving in a pattern so erratic as to be almost purely random.

And, hunting it, Leo Bochner was intent on finding his prey.

He stood beneath a sky of maroon shot with clouds of umber, which shifted to burn with abrupt, coruscating brilliance catching the eye and filling the heavens with breathtaking splendor. Clouds made of millions of reflective particles which caught the rays of the rising sun and hurled them to all sides in sheets and blazes of luminous effulgence. A kaleidoscope of broken rainbows which would dimmish as the day progressed and the dawn wind died, to return at sunset when again the winds would blow and the drifting mirrors would paint the firmament with poetry in light. An artist's dream and an awesome spectacle which, even now, was being recorded for the inhabitants of a mist-shrouded world a score of parsecs distant.

Bochner strolled to where Gale Andrei sat with her recording apparatus, her slim, lithe figure snug in form-fitting fabrics, the material delineating her petite femininity. A figure overwhelmed, it seemed, by the bulk of the apparatus which aimed wide lenses at the sky; an impression corrected by the deft motion of her slender hands as she adjusted verniers. The machine was the servant, and the woman its master, as she worked to balance scope and intensity. Too high a register in the lower end of the spectrum and the shimmering, ethereal loveliness of the violets would be dulled. Too much emphasis on the blues and the somber sullenness of the reds would lose their impact. Too high a level of brilliance would lessen fine detail and too dark an image would blunt sensory appreciation.

An attention to detail which had provided her with fame and wealth and an enviable reputation.

Bochner waited until she finally sighed and sat back in her chair, massaging her hands to ease the tension of tired muscles.

"Success, Gale?"

"Leo!" She smiled as she saw him. "Yes, I think so. Did you catch that interplay over the western horizon a few minutes ago? It was superb! That recording alone will sell at least a hundred thousand copies on Eltania."

"And on Phenge?"

"Phenge? No."

"A world of fog and misty shadows?"

"You'd think they'd snap up anything connected with light and beauty," she admitted. "I made that mistake five years ago-a recording of the ice waterfalls of Brell. The sun hits them at just the right angle twice a year, and if conditions are right, the result is fantastic. All the colors ever imagined mixed in the wildest profusion. It took me two years to get it just right, and when I did, I headed straight for Phenge. They weren't interested. They liked their mist and shadows and darkness and didn't want brightness and color. I doubt if I sold more than a score of recordings. Well, a girl learns."

"We all learn." Bochner glanced at the sky. "But some of us tend to forget. You've been out here since long before dawn and it's time you had something to eat. I've ordered a meal for the two of us and it's waiting for you to enjoy it. Ready?"

She hesitated, searching the sky, then rose from her chair and shrugged.

"You're right, Leo. I'll get nothing more until sunset. No!"

She moved to prevent him lifting her equipment. "I'll manage."

A proud woman, he thought, as he followed her to the hotel. And a strong one. She carried the heavy apparatus with apparent ease. As he would carry his own if he was on a hunt, the pack on his back and the rifle at the ready, magazine loaded, sights adjusted, safety catch released-the mechanism an extension of himself as the missile it could hurl was an extension of his arm, his will.

To kill. To wait and savor the moment. To feel the godlike power cradled in his arms. To watch the target-the woman, for example. If he were about to shoot her, where would he aim? A few inches above the upper curve of her buttocks, he decided. The bullet sent to drive into the slight concavity at the base of her spine. To smash, to break, to shock, to kill. She would fall instantly, her head unmarked and suitable for mounting as a trophy.

He could visualize it set against its background of polished wood.

A small, round head, wreathed in a soft cloud of rich, brown hair. The eyes would stare from beneath slanting eyebrows, brown and sharply appraising, touched by a master hand to give them the semblance of life. The mouth would be slightly open to reveal the inner gleam of neat, white teeth, the lips themselves full and intriguing in their implied sensuality. The jut of the chin, with its shallow cleft. The slender column of the neck. The ears. The high forehead. The…

"Leo!" He blinked, instantly alert, as she called to him. "Daydreaming?"

"Thinking. Wondering how much longer we shall have to wait."

"It can't be long now." She set down her equipment and stretched as if unconscious of the way the gesture enhanced the firm thrust of her breasts. "Today, tomorrow, what does it matter?"

"It doesn't, if you're working." Bochner led the way to where a table stood beside a window, its surface loaded with glass and cutlery, china and covered dishes. As they sat, a waiter hurried forward to pour them both cups of fragrant tisane. "But what is there for me to do on Kumetat? If any game exists in the wilderness, it is small and relatively harmless. Suitable only for the training of beginners in the art of assessing the environment and location of the lair."

"And the stalk?"

He glanced at her and smiled. "The stalk! What can be better? The art of pitting your mind and strength, your skill and cunning, against another. A beast which would kill you if given the chance. A creature armed and armored by nature against which you are weak and defenseless aside from your own intelligence, the power of your mind."

"And, naturally, of your gun," she said dryly. "We must never forget the gun, must we?"

"You don't approve?"

"Of killing animals? No."

"Of hunting?"

"Of a stalk where, as you say, it is mind pitted against mind and cunning against cunning, yes. My father used to hunt when I was young and he took me with him when I was old enough to keep up. But he never carried a gun. He used a camera. It was enough to get up close and record the event. The fun, he used to say, was in the chase. The stalk. Any fool can kill."

He said blandly, "Of course. Now, may a fool offer you some refreshment? Slices of meat, cooked in a piquant sauce, and highly recommended by the chef? This compote of fruits, honey and nuts? A slice of bread coated with spiced seeds? An egg-they are worth trying. Or-" He broke off, looking at the hand she had placed on his own.

"Leo, I'm sorry."

"For calling me a fool?"

"You're not that, and we both know it. It's just that, well, a man with a gun never seems to give an animal a sporting chance. He stands back and fires and that's it, if he's any shot at all. Where's the danger?"

"For a man facing a beast which can't reach or hurt him-none," he admitted. "Such work is butchery. But to hunt a beast you must hit in exactly the right place with the single shot which is all time will allow, and first to track it to a point where it is at home and you are not-that isn't work for fools."

"Or for men?"

Too late, she tried to cover her distaste and, for a moment, he felt the anger rise within him; the burning rage which had always been his unconscious reaction to criticism and which, uncontrolled, could lead him to kill. Had led him to kill; the act itself a catharsis, easing as it cleansed-a luxury he could not at this time afford. Yet, it was hard to master his anger. That this mere recorder of transient spectacles should dare to deride him and what he represented! To mock the grim essentials of life itself! To ignore the fundamental truth which had accompanied mankind from the beginning and would stay with him until the end. How could she be such an ignorant fool?

And yet, looking at her as he reached for syrup and poured it over the chopped vegetables and prepared cereal in his bowl, he found it difficult to recognize her stupidity. Had the words been a mask? A test? A probe to trigger a reaction? Was she also, in her way, a hunter, and he her prey? Was she the bait skillfully offered to be withdrawn should he strike too fast or come too close?

Inwardly, he bared his teeth in a smile which was a tiger's snarl. If so, she had met her match. It was a game in which he did not lack experience.

He said, "Men do what they must. Some fight. Some hunt. Some kill. Always there must be those who hunt and those who are hunted. It is a law of nature."

"Yes," she said, and added in a peculiarly strained tone, "Life is a continuous act of violence."

"Of course. To live, it is necessary to kill." He gestured at the table, the plate of eggs, the dish of meat. The movement left no need for words. "We grow too serious. You record the beauty which you see and I, too, in a way, seek to provide a similar experience to those who are willing to pay for it. For death, in essence, is also beauty. As all great catastrophes are; fires, floods, volcanoes-"

"Destroyers," she said, musingly. "And I suppose the extinction of a personal universe could be regarded in such a light. After all, to the one involved, no catastrophe could be greater. The total erasure of all a living thing held to be real. An end. A termination." She shivered despite the warmth of the day. "Let's not talk about it."

A reluctance which did not match Bochner's assessment of her character. She was nothing if not strong, yet she had revealed a certain sensitivity he found interesting. Was it a mask to hide her real personality?

He remembered a predator on Rhius which spread false trails of pungent scent when pursued; exudations which contained subtle pheromones so that, entranced, those intent on the kill suddenly found themselves helpless victims to their imagined prey.

Was the girl such a one?

Did it matter if she was?

The afternoon, he decided, after she had bathed and changed and taken a little rest. When the sun had passed its zenith and the air still with sultry heat. She would be bored, restless, willing to indulge in a new experience. Intrigued by his attentions, and half expecting him to call, as call he would. To sit in her room, her lair, to talk with her for awhile, to touch, to let the ancient magic work its biological charm and, even if she struggled, he would take her. He would make his symbolical kill.

But before the meal was over, the air quivered to the roar of manmade thunder as the Entil came in to land.