The World Menders

XIV

As soon as Farrari awoke he crossed the valley for another look at the ol carvings, and the mute figures displayed there were as bafflingly uncommunicative as before. It seemed to Farrari that every discovery concerning the olz merely intensified their enigma. Evidently the rascz had followed the olz in making the Tower-of-a-Thousand-Eyes the center of their religion. Was it only the tower that they adopted? No amount of pondering enabled Far-rani to comprehend a turn of events by which the conquerors took the religion of the conquered and the conquered made gods of the conquerors.

Bran was still in bed when Farrari returned—wide awake, but lying motionless, muffled in robes, a dark, brooding expression on his scarred face. He answered surlily when Farrari spoke to him. The ol actions that perplexed Farrari had crushed Bran.

Finally he bestirred himself and slouched down to the stream, where he scooped a handful of water and in the same motion tilted back his head and tossed the water into his mouth. Then he pivoted slowly and slouched back to the cave.

Farrari had never been able to drink ol fashion without splashing his face or losing most of the water. He had to drink in secret, because any ol, even a child, could perform that exacting operation with precision. Bran had not wasted a drop except what he absently shook from his hand afterward.

Bran was the complete ol. The things Farrari, by dint of intense concentration and effort, did half well and hoped that no one would notice, Bran did instinctively and perfectly. Years of playing the part to its minutest detail had made the role of ol more natural to him than his own identity. Bran was…

He was too perfect. Farrari had observed the olz far more intently than they ever observed each other, and he also had observed IPR agents acting as olz, and suddenly it seemed to him that there were differences. The experienced IPR agent aimed at anonymity, at portraying the average ol, because he could not risk the slightest irregularity that might call attention to himself. He acted as most olz would have acted in any given circumstance.

But there was no such thing as an average ol. All were individuals, all had idiosyncrasies. The ol who was average in everything stood out as distinctively as if he’d been radically eccentric. It seemed odd that the IPR Bureau had never perceived this, and odder that the olz had not detected the synthetically average olz that IPR sent among them. Or had they?

Bran seated himself on a slab of rock, ripped open a rations package, and began chomping on biscuits while directing a blank ol stare across the valley. Farrari sat down beside him.

“What is the ol religion?” he asked.

“You saw it,” Bran growled. “They worship their durrlz.”

“It can’t be that simple. What’s the background of myth, or superstition, that made them accept their conquerors as gods?”

Bran shook his head. “That stuff is for the specialists at base.”

“What do the yilescz have to do with it?”

Bran shrugged and shook his head again.

In Farrari’s training religion had not been mentioned. In all of his field experience he had encountered nothing that remotely suggested it, but it did not seem possible that an intelligent race could be so devoid of religious thought, traditions, practices or superstitions. “The question is,” Farrari mused, “haven’t the olz got any, or are they just extraordinarily successful in keeping it a secret?”

“If they had any, I would have found out about it,” Bran growled. “You can’t live with a people for years, be one of them for years, without knowing whether they have religion.”

“Did you know that they worshiped their durrlz?”

“No…”

“The specialists at base don’t know it, which means that no other agent knows it. What do the olz do with their dead?”

“Nothing special. They have a burial cave if they can find one. Otherwise I suppose they dig graves, or cremate them.”

“Is there a ceremony?”

“I dunno. I helped carry a lot of dead to burial caves, but I never hung around to find out if there was a ceremony.”

“Why not?” Farrari demanded. “The other olz from my village didn’t wait, so I didn’t wait.”

He lurched to his feet and slouched away, still munching biscuits. Farrari went back across the valley for another look at the carvings.

He could think of no explanation of the Tower-of-a-Thousand-Eyes except as a religious edifice. The ancient olz must have possessed a highly evolved religion, with a priesthood, dogma and elaborate public ceremonies. What had happened to it?

In the days that followed he repeatedly questioned Bran, but Bran did not know and refused to speculate. Farrari wanted to make plans, to try other experiments. Bran responded with a tirade against the olz, and morosely slouched away, and Farrari, shaken by this unexpected attack, left off his attempts to understand the olz until he could better understand Bran.

Obviously Bran scorned the olz, but he hated the rascz, and that hatred had festered and swollen from the moment years before when he dragged his bloody body away to die. For years he had savored the revenge that would come when the olz turned on their masters. The savoring, the anticipation, were almost enough to satisfy him.

Now the terrible revenge upon which he had focused his existence for so long was exposed as ludicrous folly, and even the savoring was denied to him. The fury that unexpectedly lashed at the olz could also strike Farrari.

Farrari’s instinct told him to leave immediately, but he could not. Bran was the one person who might be able to help him. In his uncertainty he did nothing, and several more days passed.

Then Bran became unaccountably cheerful, led Farrari about the valley to show him the networks of caves, reminisced voluably about his life with the olz, about the IPR Academy, and even resurrected forgotten memories of his childhood when he learned that he and Farrari came from adjacent star systems. At night he brought out crocks of wine he had made from zrilmberries—Thorald Dallum would have adored him—and for hours they sipped wine and talked.

The abrupt change of mood aroused Farrari’s suspicion. After several such nights he began to wonder if Bran were not too generous with his wine while drinking too little himself.

Farrari awoke suddenly to find the sleeping room silent. Bran’s quiet snores, his shallow, whistling breathing—he even breathed like an ol—were missing. Farrari checked Bran’s empty bed and then, with a hand-light, searched the cave. He went to the opening, sent a call echoing across the valley, got no answer. He felt his way through the darkness to the place where, under a ledge of rock, Bran had been keeping his platform. It was gone.

He returned to the cave and went to Bran’s handmade communication center. At once he got a beam on a platform, approaching rapidly, so he switched off the instrument, returned to his bed, and feigned sleep. Bran shuttled in a short time later and went directly to his own bed.

The following night Bran left as soon as he thought Farrari asleep, and Farrari tracked his platform until it landed or his low altitude took him out of range. Half an hour passed, and then Farrari picked up the platform again, returning. The next two nights Bran remained in bed, and then he was off again—three expeditions in a row, all to widely-separated places. The pattern continued, days passed, and then Farrari, kicking himself for crass stupidity, thought to make further use of Bran’s equipment and monitor the IPR communications channels.

Peter Jorrul’s crisp voice: “… Mass movement of the kru’s cavalry into the hilngol. At least six durrlz have been murdered, and in two instances an ol is known to have been responsible… presumed to have been an ol in every case, though probably not the same ol, the locations are too widely separated… no ol agents in the hilngol and a bad time to try to place one… possibly Farrari, but he couldn’t have done all of it, no one person could be covering that much ground on foot… very much afraid a mass slaughter of olz is in the offing… comment and suggestions invited…no, requested … from all stations…”

Bran tiptoed into the dark cave, and an enraged Farrari seized him.

“You’ve condemned to death whole villages of olz!”

“They’re going to die anyway,” Bran said indifferently. “They want to die. I’m making the rascz pay a little in advance.”

Farrari released him. “Don’t you see what you’re doing? By arousing the rascz against the olz, you’ll make it impossible to do anything meaningful to help them.”

“I can go right on killing durrlz,” Bran said. “That’s meaningful. As soon as the soldiers get here I’ll switch to another district. That’ll give ’em something to think about.”

“This is my fault,” Farrari muttered. “I knew you were sneaking out at night. I should have stopped you.”

“How would you do that?” Bran asked with a chuckle.

He dropped onto his bed and fell asleep at once, and Farrari went to work on the platform. He smashed the operating mechanism, went through Bran’s stores looking for replacement parts and smashed them, and then he resolutely turned his back on Bran and the valley and strode off toward the nearest ol village.

“These olz,” he told himself determinedly, “are mine.” The kru and all of his minions of iniquity could take notice: this one small village was private property—Farrari’s to cherish, to protect to the death if need be.

He could not have said why. The fate of one ol village in this land was as the fate of a drop of water in the ocean, and though the olz still fascinated him he neither loved nor respected them. Perhaps like Bran he merely hated the rascz, though more impersonally. He would have hated anyone who treated another creature as the durrlz did the olz.

He joined the olz in the fields and immediately discovered his error. Bran had been too wise to carry out his depredations so close to his valley. These olz went calmly about their work. At mid-morning the durrl arrived, watched impassively, and continued on his rounds.

The soldiers certainly would not molest olz whom the durrl so obviously had under complete control. The village Farrari had lately sworn to protect did not need it. As soon as the durrl left, Farrari quietly made his own departure. He was determined to find a village that needed him, and he would have to travel fast. The olz he intended to protect might be dead before he reached them.

As he headed down into the lower hingol the heat became sweltering. The ground underfoot was parched and hard, fields of grain had turned a mottled brown, and even the deadly zrilm leaves drooped and shriveled—and remained deadly. Farrari traveled south for no better reason than that he expected the soldiers to come from that direction, and he recklessly traveled by daylight because he could move faster. He passed village after village of humdrum activity, forcing himself to hurry and at the same time trying to pace himself because he had no notion of how far he must go. The land, the people, the silly mission he had propelled himself on—all seemed unreal under the heat of a somnolent summer day, and so it happened that when he abruptly came upon a ravished ol village the sight stunned him.

The lane took a sudden turning, and before him lay the still-smoldering ashes of collapsed huts and the pathetic scattering of dead olz, and the clinging, sweetly rancid odor of burned flesh seared his nostrils. Farrari gripped his staff with trembling fingers and contemplated the holocaust. These were the olz who should have had his protection, and he was too late.

Not until then did he notice other plumes of smoke pointing skyward against the scorching sun.

A shout and the patter of many small hooves shattered his bleak mood and sent him scrambling for a zrilm hedge. Moments later he saw the prancing gril legs as the kru’s cavalry flashed past. Farrari acted without thinking: he thrust his staff through a tangle of zrilm roots and braced himself, and he was quite as astonished as the rider must have been when a gril stumbled and crashed to the ground.

A bundle of spears dropped beside the hedge, and Farrari gathered it in, slipped through the opposite side of the hedge, and trotted along the edge of a field of tubers. At the end of the field he poked his way back through the zrilm and looked up the lane to where the soldiers had gathered about the fallen grit. Thoughtfully he balanced a spear in his hand. He stepped into the lane, took aim, and let fly.

With a dozen soldiers and grilz blocking the narrow lane he thought he could not miss; but the light spear, perfectly designed for throwing, whipped unnoticed above the heads of the soldiers.

Farrari’s second attempt grazed a gril’s flank. The beast reared and screamed, the soldiers turned their attention to the gril, and so little were they accustomed to being on the receiving end of thrown spears that incredibly they failed to notice Farrari.

He did not believe in pressing his luck. He filled the air with his remaining six spears, throwing as fast as he could take aim. Then he ducked for cover, and as he vanished into the hedge a spear whistled past his head, a snap throw by an expert and a sobering reminder to do his future target practice from concealment. Peering through the hedge, he noted with chagrin that all of his spears had missed. The soldiers made a hasty retreat with their dismounted comrade riding double, and as soon as they disappeared Farrari darted into the lane in search of spears. He found two and retired to the hedge to plan his next move.

The soldiers would be back. At this moment they were probably in conference with their commander, trying to convince him that they had not imagined an ol throwing spears at them, and when the commander had given the matter sober consideration he must conclude that an ol uncommon enough to throw spears could be the same one who’d been uncommon enough to stab durrlz in the dark. The soldiers would be back.

And Farrari would be waiting, though not where they expected to find him. He moved some distance down the lane, found a place in the hedge that satisfied him, and made himself comfortable. He watched and listened, and soon he discovered that the pattern of hedges had a distorting effect on sounds. Some were blocked out, others were amplified and their direction confused. Several times Farrari thought he heard grilz approaching, and when they finally came he did not hear them until they were almost upon him.

As he peered out cautiously, he was dumbfounded to see the third gril of the column crash to the ground, and an instant later a spear whistled from the opposite hedge and neatly impaled the leading trooper. He fell and his gril ran off braying wildly. Farrari managed to launch his two spears before the soldiers fled. He missed, but two more spears from the opposite hedge caught retreating soldiers squarely in their backs.

Farrari stepped from the hedge to survey the carnage: Three dead soldiers, one dying gril. He called out guardedly, “Who are you?”

The zrilm parted. Bran’s ugly face grinned out at Farrari. “I got to hand it to you,” he said admiringly. “I never thought of this. It beats killing durrlz in their sleep.”

“How’d you find me?” Farrari demanded.

“Wasn’t hard once I found out what way you were going. I just kept flying on ahead and waiting for you to catch up.”

“Flying—”

“Oh, that.” Bran shrugged. “I got two more platforms.”

“How’d you get so proficient with spears?”

“I dunno,” Bran said. “I just aim and throw.”

“That’s all I do.” Farrari said, “but I never hit anything.”

Farrari helped himself to a bundle of spears. Bran hurried to claim another, and they divided the third: Farrari could not help thinking that it was Bran who had destroyed the ol village, but recriminations would not have helped the dead olz. On the other hand, a show of resistance here would keep the rascz from killing ol elsewhere. Bran enjoyed killing soldiers; let him help.

“They’ll be back,” he told Bran “but they’ll take their time about and maybe send for reinforcements If they have any military sense at all they’ll change their tactics. If I’d paid more attention to Semar Kantz, maybe I’d know what they’ll do.”

Bran stirred impatiently. “Let ’em come,” he said.

“We’ll try a new location,” Farrari decided. “It’d be a mistake to always ambush them at the same place. And then we’ll separate: me on one side, you across the lane fifty meters away. Whichever way they come from, we’ll hold our fire until we have the whole troop between us. And once the fun starts, they’ll think there are more of us if we duck trough the fields and take up new positions.”

Bran grinned and nodded.

“Let’s find a place we like, then, and get under cover.”

They moved beyond the smoldering village and set their ambush. Time passed; nothing happened except that a large, multi-legged insect ran across Farrari’s bare leg and each foot punctured the skin. He stared in amazement at the double row of tiny blood spots, for he’d felt nothing at all, but a short time later the leg began to throb and swell. It was a horror the specialists at base had failed to mention.

The pain grew worse. Finally Farrari hobbled down the lane to Bran’s hiding place, and Bran took a look and grimaced. “Oh, one of those. Tomorrow you won’t be able to walk.”

“I can hardly walk now,” Farrari said disgustedly. “How long does it last?”

“Couple of days, unless I got a medical kit in the platform. I kept one in the other platform,” he added accusingly, “but I don’t remember if I got one in this one. I’ll go look.”

“Be careful,” Farrari cautioned. “Keep to the fields as much as possible.”

Bran nodded, parted the hedge, and scurried through. Farrari followed him and sat down by the hedge to watch Bran lope off across the field. After a time he felt uneasy in the open, even in a zrilm enclosed field, so he crept back into the hedge and waited there.

Then a squad of cavalry came down the lane. Farrari fingered his spears longingly but did not throw—an ambush seemed perfectly safe to him as long as he could hit and run, but he could no longer run. He watched the squad pass, instantly concerned about Bran—because these troops rode walking grilz, and a walking gril made no noise at all. It suggested that the rascz were setting up an ambush of their own.

As soon as the column passed, Farrari started after Bran. He used his staff as a crutch, but stumbling around the hills of tubers made slow and painful going. He crossed several fields and finally came to a lane, where he cautiously parted the zrilm and looked through.

Bran lay a short distance down the lane, his body bristling with spears. Farrari staggered to his side, but he knew before he reached him that he would be dead, that no one could survive so many wounds in vital places.

He paused there only for a moment, but when he straightened up the cavalry troop was almost upon him. With two good legs he might have reached the hedge—barely—but he could manage only a staggering lunge before the spear crashed into his side. As he hit the ground he screamed—or tried to scream“skudkru,” but the second spear was already on the way.