The World Wreckers Read online

  "Our family have always honored the forge-goddess," said Linnea quietly, "and we had nothing to do with the abuse of that power later."

  "I know that, or you would have died when Sharra's matrix was broken," Regis said. Normal color began to flow back into his face. "Then, if your grandmother is not too old to make the journey from the hills-"

  "She is too old, Lord Regis, but she will make it just the same," Linnea said, and her gray eyes glinted with mischief. "You will find her a surprising person, my grandmother."

  Acting on sudden impulse, Regis drew the girl's hand through his arm as they went into the lower Council room. Suddenly, he felt less lonely.

  As Old Hastur had said, much of what happened in the Council room was more of the same. Regis had been hearing it for seven of his twenty-four years and it had had a familiar sound long before that. There had been, for almost a hundred years, one or another party on Darkover fascinated by Terran technology and the hypothetical benefits of joining their interplanetary civilization. They were in the smallest of minorities and seldom listened to. Once every few years the Council, or such a council as there was in these days, gave them a formal hearing, thanked them for their opinions, solemnly voted to ignore their recommendations and it was all over for a few more years. This was no exception. Regis sat in the seat marked with the insignia of the Hastur, the silver fir on the blue ground and the Hastur slogan, ####Permanedó (Here we remain), and looked around the ancient high-seats, filled now with the merest remnant of the old laran caste; with minor nobility, younger sons, anyone who could or would take responsibility for one of the Domains.

  He could ignore the first delegation, that group of smug businessmen who called themselves the Pan-Darkovan League. They looked sleek and firm. Despite their complaints, they weren't hurting, even though, he was willing to admit, there were fat profits to be had from an expanding civilization and it hurt them to miss out.

  But when the delegation from the lower foothills of the Hellers was ushered in, Regis sat up and suddenly began to take notice.

  He knew some of the mountain men. He'd climbed with them, in the days when he could manage to get away on such trips. He'd lived at the edge of the mountains all his life. He liked them, in many ways, better than the complacent lowland people of the Domains.

  These were mountain men of the old style: booted and wrapped in thick fur shirt-cloaks, swarthy and long-haired, and although some of them were young, their faces were lined with rough weather and their eyes wrinkled with seeing into the far distances. They looked up at Regis with the old kind of respect for the Comyn caste, a direct and simple awareness; but they were wild-eyed with fatigue and grief which had been sustained much longer than men are meant to bear such things. And even though they tried to speak with stoical calm, some hint of this showed.

  Their leader was an old man, grayed and grizzled with a profile something like one of the sharp-toothed crags behind the city. He addressed himself to Old Hastur, even though Regis sat in the seat of the head of council. "I am Daniskar of the Darriel Forst," he said briefly. "I swore thirty years ago that I'd starve to death and all my family with me before we crawled down into the lowlands to ask help of the Comyn, let alone the accursed Terrans." He looked about to spit, evidently remembered in time where he was and didn't. "But we're dying, Lord. Our children are starving. Dying."

  Mine too, thought Regis, not starving but dying, and leaned forward, speaking in the mountain tongue. "Com'ii, I am to blame that we have heard nothing of crop failure or famine in your hills."

  Daniskar shook his head. He said, "You don't get crops back there, Lord, there's no plowed land for crops. We live off the forests. And that's the problem; we're being burned out. Vai dom, do you know how many forest fires we've had just this season? You wouldn't more than half believe me if I told you. And nothing we can do stops them. Forest fires are nothing new; I fought them before my beard was grown. I know as much as any man from the Kadarin to the Wall Around the World about forest fires. But these-nothing we can do stops them. It's as if resin fuel had been poured on them. Our beacons fail. I'd say they were being set by human hands, only what living man could be so evil? Men can kill men if they hate them, but to harm a forest so that men who never harmed them would suffer, friend and foe alike?"

  Regis listened in shock and horror, seeing his own horror mirrored in other faces around the Council room, and his mind, trained to think on many levels at once, ran counterpoint to Daniskar's words. Darkover is a wooded world, and without our forests we die. No cover for beasts means no meat for those who eat it, no nuts for bread where grains do not grow, no furs for warmth, no fuel where the lack of fire means freezing and death. The death of the forest means no resin or phosphorescents for light, no fruits for wine, it means no soil, for only our forests hold the soil on the mountains with so much rain and snow to wash it down to the lowlands. Without forests, over half of Dark-over would quickly become a frozen lump of dust, starving and dying.

  "You people talk fine about keeping us free of the Terran Empire," said one of the businessmen, looking up belligerently at the council members and especially, it seemed to Regis, at the two Hasturs. "And you have a right to your own politics, though I notice you're quick enough to take advantage of Terran things when you're rich enough to afford them. Like coining here by plane, under guard, instead of packing over the mountains on horse and by snow sled as I did! I don't even say you're all wrong; anyone who takes a helping hand must turn to his helper's path! But how far are you going to make us go for this thing you call freedom, vai dom'ym? Must all our mountain men die before you ask the Terrans to pull us out of quicksand? We have given them a spaceport and a crossroad in their Empire. We could be a pivot in that Empire, an important one. Why don't we make them give us more?"

  "We don't care about that," Daniskar said. "We don't want the Terrans here half so much as you do, Lords. But we need more help than you can give us. They have flying machines, chemicals, quick communications, they could put a real effort to it."

  "Do you want roads, factories, machinery in your world?

  Do you want another Trade City in the Hellers, Daniskar?" Old Hastur asked.

  "Not me, Lord. I saw the edge of a Trade City once and they stink. But it's better than seeing all our people die. We need help from somewhere, and fast-or there won't be enough of us left to care whether we get it or not!"

  And the Terrans, Regis knew, would be only too glad to help. World after world had fallen into the Empire in just such a way. A bad season, or an epidemic, or a few too many deaths from famine, and the proudest world, knowing that now there were alternatives to the hard laws of survival of the strongest, were no longer willing to submit themselves to those hard laws.

  It's as if the gods themselves were against us.

  First the telepaths go. One by one, in fratricidal blood-feud, or sterile from inbreeding, or by assassination and mischance. Our old science goes from lack of telepath minds to make the matrices work.

  Now our forests.

  Soon we will have no choice.

  But why? Who?

  It was like the flashing of a light; this was no blow of the gods. It was too deliberate. Darkover was being murdered; not dying of natural causes, being murdered.

  But who would possibly want to wreck a world? Who could profit?

  When the delegation from the mountains had finished, they all waited expectantly for Regis to speak. Even his grandfather turned his eyes on Regis, to see what he would say.

  And what could he say? "You must have help with the fire problem," he said- at last, "all the help you can get, whether it comes from the Terran Empire or elsewhere. But I'm not prepared yet to ask them to reclassify our world for Open status, just for this. So far, we can pay for the help we ask for. As far as needed, I can pledge my own private resources for this." He did not need to look at his grandfather for approval of the rather reckless commitment he had made; it was the only thing to do. "We can also make
demands of the chiefs in the lowlands, assess a part of the payment from them."

  One of the men from the Pan-Darkovan League said, "Are you expecting us to bankrupt ourselves? If we had Open status as an Empire world we could demand this sort of help as a right, and there would be outside investors coming in to help us exploit our unused resources to pay for it."

  Regis said dryly, "My thanks for the lesson in elementary economics, monsieur. Nevertheless, although I'm sure you have made a study of the problem, I'm not sure I agree with you about what would be exploited." His eyes, hard and piercing gray, and angry, met the lowlander's and it was the other man who dropped his gaze.

  It was a delaying action, Regis knew, not a victory. Forest fires, if this were simply an unlucky season or a series of natural catastrophes, could be coped with. But in combination with the attack on telepaths-my children, he thought again with the familiar anguish, and tried to shut off the vivid, almost visible memory-picture of the two small fair faces in their coffins-or if some unknown force were actually working to upset the delicate balance of forces on Darkover, then it was probably hopeless. The Darkovans could cling to their own patterns and die-or change so radically that it would be a form of death for most of those who knew it.

  Is there any hope at all? Are we all doomed?

  He had delayed a decision, but as they broke up and moved out of the room, he knew that it would descend on him personally, more heavily than ever. He stopped to say a few gracious words to Daniskar of the Darriel Forst. The other nobles would give adequate courtesies to the Pan-Darkovans, but the sensitive and proud mountain men must not be neglected. When he took leave of the chief, he realized that the girl Linnea was still close at his side, no longer touching him (physical contact was rare in a telepath caste except in direct sexual or emotional en-

  counters) but well within the range of his perception. He turned and smiled at her, tiredly, and said, "This wouldn't be your first council, but I dare say it's the worst yet."

  She nodded, gravely. "Those poor men," she whispered. "They are my own people, Lord Regis, men from our own villages, and I had no idea, I've been away in the lowlands so long. How terrible for them. And for you-Regis, Regis, I had heard nothing about your children-" She raised her eyes to his. As their glances locked they were suddenly in deep rapport. She blurted out, abruptly, "Let me give you others."

  He raised his hands slowly, and laid them on either side of her face. Like the girl, he was too deeply moved for speech. For an instant time stopped and they stood together outside it, more deeply joined than in any act of love.

  It was a new thing to Regis, although women had been attracted to him all his life. Mostly for the wrong reasons, of course. And a telepath could never be ignorant of the reasons. Many had been attracted to him because of his position and power; still more had been strongly drawn to him because of his extraordinary good looks, because of his vitality, even-and he knew it-because of his own strongly sensual personality. He had grown cynical about women, even while he took what was offered. Especially during the last few years, promiscuity was expected, even strongly urged, among the young telepaths of his caste.

  The offer itself was nothing new. He knew, completely without vanity, that he could have virtually any woman he wanted, and as a result there were not many he wanted.

  But this was the first time that a girl of his own caste- and Linnea, he began to realize, was an extraordinary telepath had come to him in such complete simplicity. It wasn't pity, it was a sudden, deep sharing of his own emotion. There had been no hint of the status which she, of a minor house, might gain by bearing a laran heir to Hastur. There was not even any sense, except perhaps at the deepest level, of wanting him sensually; like most extravagantly handsome men he had grown very tired of that, and it repelled him rather than otherwise.

  None of that. Linnea had simply sensed how difficult his life had become, and through a sudden deep sharing had wanted to make it easier for him, and had offered what she had to give.

  They had stood locked together only a few seconds; but both of them knew how the world had changed for them. Then, the wheels of the universe began to go around again, they fell back into the elaborate games of ordinary life; and Regis sighed, let his hands fall from her cheeks, leaned forward and kissed her lips gently. He said, with infinite regret, "Not now, my darling. Although, if we are later blessed-but just now we need you where you are. There are so few of you girls, now, who can work the matrix relays. How can I put out more of the lights on our world?"

  She nodded, in a serious and infinitely tender understanding. She said: "I know. If too many of us are taken away at once we will be what the Terrans call us, a world of barbarians."

  Their clasped hands fell apart. They did not need pledges or promises for what was so deep a part of them. Yet Regis reached out again and drew her within the curve of his arm, suddenly struck with a spasm of fear.

  A child of Linnea's would be too precious to risk to

  fate

  Must I fear for her too? Witt she be the next target?

  The chieri came out of the forest, dazed and wild-eyed, staring about like some feral thing from the deepest woods. Even on Darkover, where human and half-human had lived side by side since the depths of their world's prehistory, this was something to collect a crowd; and it did. Murmurs of awe, astonishment and wonder were hushed in the streets as the tall and strange being moved, with slow, deliberate purposiveness along the cobblestoned walkway where none of his kind had ever trodden before.

  The chieri were a legend; most people had never more than half believed in them; and as soon as the rumor spread that a chieri, alive and in the flesh, was walking the streets of Arilinn, people came quietly out of their houses and watched, edging back with little silent whispers of astonishment as the nonhuman moved-slowly and deliberately, as if dragging a reluctant way-toward the tall loom of the Arilinn Tower.

  It moved more and more slowly and finally its slow footsteps came to a halt. It turned toward the crowd and said something, in appeal. The voice was clear and light and beautiful, as legend said, but the words completely incomprehensible, and the people simply stared without understanding until finally an old man in a scholar's robe said, "Let me through; I believe he is speaking in a very old mode of the casta. I have seen it written in old books, though I never attempted to speak it. I will try." The crowd made room for the old man, and he made a deep bow to the nonhuman and said, "You lend us grace, Noble One. How may we serve you?"

  The chieri said, slowly as if the words were long rusty with nonuse, "I am-very stranger here to this place. I have been-" a word none of them could comprehend. "There is a Hastur here. Can you direct me to that place where he is?"

  The old scholar said, "If you will follow, Noble One," and led the way toward the Tower. He told his friends later: "It looked at me, and I realized it was afraid, afraid in a way that none of us has ever been afraid. I still shake all over when I think about anything like that, being as frightened as all that. I wonder what it wanted?"

  Regis Hastur was at breakfast in his rooms in the Arilinn Tower, making ready for the departure of the plane that had brought him here, when one of the young matrix workers of the Tower, a boy of seventeen or eighteen, came to his door. "Vai dom-"

  Regis turned and said courteously, "How may I serve you, Marton?" "Lord, there is a chieri at the gates below, asking to meet with you, with the Hastur."

  "A chieri?" Suddenly Regis laughed. "This language of Arilinn still defeats me at times; I misheard you; a kyrri we would say in Thendara, one of your nonhuman servants here. Can you find out what it wants for me?"

  "No, my lord, not a kyrri," Marton looked scandalized. "As if any of them would so presume! No, Lord Regis, a chieri, one of the old Beautiful Folk of the Forest."

  Startled, Regis said, "If this is a jest I find it ill-timed," but another look at the boy convinced him that the youngster was as surprised and disbelieving as he was himself. He rose without fu
rther delay and went down to the foot of the Tower.

  A chieri! Even in his grandfather's day it was rumored that few or none of that oldest race on Darkover still survived, deep in the deepest woods. Never in living memory had one come out of the forest; at. most there were strange tales of folk lost or hurt or benighted in the forest, who found themselves succored by strange hands, gentle voices and kindliness, and promptly guided on their way again, and no more than this.

  He came out of the dark corridors at the foot of the Tower, and into the pale light of the rising sun, and there, standing in a little awed circle of the servitors, the furred kyrri and the uniformed City Guard and a few bystanders, he had his first sight of the chieri.

  It stood on the cobblestones, seeming to stand apart from the others, looking very much like a tall young man, or even a tall young girl, except that the features seemed a little too thin, too pale, too delicate to be human. It was taller than tall Regis, by almost a full head. It had quantities of pale hair, that glinted silver gilt. It turned slowly to Regis, moving with a grace and beauty alien and unknown to humankind; and then Regis raised his eyes and met those of the chieri.