Anderson, Poul - Novel 18 Read online

  The Winter of the World

  Poul Anderson

  ATOM DOHERTY ASSOCIATES BOOK

  NEW YORK

  NOTE: If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental.

  THE WINTER OF THE WORLP

  Copyright © 1976 by Poul Anderson

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.

  Cover art by Paul Lehr

  A Tor Book

  Published by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.

  175 Fifth Avenue New York, N.Y. 10010

  Tor® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.

  ISBN: 0-812-52311-3

  First Tor edition: February 1995

  Printed in the United States of America 0987654321

  To

  George Scithers

  in memory of many a pleasant journey on the

  Terminus, Owlswick, & Ft. Mudge Electrick

  Street Railway

  Contents

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 1

  Once during the Ice Age, three men came riding to Owlhaunt, where Donya of Hervar had her wintergarth. This was on the Stallion River, northwest of the outpost Fuld by four days’ travel which the wayfarer from Arvanneth found hard.

  The sun had entered the Elk last month and now was aloft longer than a night lasted. Nevertheless, earth still was white; the old stiff snow creaked beneath hoofs. A wind, cutting across level evening light, carried a feel of tundras beyond the horizon and glacial cliffs beyond those.

  The country hereabouts came nearer being taiga, though: rolling, mostly open, lean blue shadows tucked in it everywhere, but spiked with groves, darkling pine, birch on whose twigs only icicles grew as yet, shivery willow. Its sky shaded from violet to the east, where early stars blinked forth, across a pale zenith to green around a disc the color of blood. Crows cawed overhead, nestbound. Far above them, a hawk at hover caught glow on its wings. Quail scattered to right and left of the riders, as if on wheels. A pheasant flew in splendor from a blackberry thicket. On a ridge that bounded the view south, several hundred big game animals pawed after moss and remnant grass: prairie deer, horse, moonhom cattle, dwarf bison mingled together. From time to time, unseen, a wild hound bayed and a coyote yelped answer. It was a rich land the Hervar kith held.

  Two of the men belonged in it, Rogaviki bom. Theirs were the shoulderbreadth, ranginess, and height of that race—the stirrups hung low on their shaggy little ponies—as well as the fair skin, long head, face wide and shortnosed and strong in the cheekbones, slant in the eyes. They happened to be clad much alike, too, fringed buckskin shirts and trousers ornamented with dyed porcupine quills, soft half-boots, hooded woolen cloaks. Each bore two knives, a massive cutting tool and a slim missile; boar spear, hatchet, bow, quiver, and lasso were at their saddles. Zhano’s hair was ruddy and he wore it in braids coiled above his nape; Kyrian’s was brown, cut along the jawline. At their ages, seventeen and eighteen, neither could grow a real beard, so both went clean-shaven. Zhano was the eldest child of Donya, Kyrian her youngest husband.

  The third was Casiru, former thief, swindler, and cutthroat, presently vicechief of the Rattlebone Brotherhood and hence a director of thieves, swindlers, and cutthroats. He had the amber complexion and black eyes common in Arvanneth, but not the handsomeness. At fifty, he was small, scrawny, sharp-featured. The hair trimmed above his ears and the beard and mustache trimmed to points had long since gone wispy-gray. A few snag teeth clattered in the cold. His sober-hued elegance of tunic, hose, and shoes was adequate for the South, but not here. He huddled in a borrowed mantle and cursed drearily. The scabbard of his rapier stuck out from beneath like a frozen tail.

  Because Zhano and Kyrian were supposed to conduct him to Owlhaunt as fast as might be—after an express courier brought word to Donya that he was aboard a coach for Fuld—they had not hunted their food along the way, but loaded meat, mead, and dried fruit on a packbeast. A second carried a tent, since it was not to be awaited that a city man could simply spread his bedroll out for the night. A third had Casiru’s belongings. A fourth, unladen, relieved the rest and was a spare in case of accidents. Otherwise they took no remounts. It was not to be expected either that a city man could travel at the pace of Rogaviki in a hurry.

  Thrice this day they had glimpsed the smoke from a homestead, and Casiru asked if that might be their goal. His guides said no. Talk came hard when he had scant knowledge of their language or they of his. Mostly it struggled in Rahidian, a tongue he spoke fluently and they had learned well enough for trade or combat. They managed to explain that those places housed members of Donya’s Fellowship—the best translation of gorozdy they could arrive at—which was the biggest such informal association of several families to be found in Hervar. Casiru thought of it as hers because he gathered that, in some fashion he didn’t quite understand, she led it.

  Finally the riders topped a certain crest. Zhano pointed. “There!” he grinned, thumped heels on his mustang, and yelled his way down at a gallop. Kyrian trotted after, leading guest and paekhorses.

  Casiru strained his gaze ahead. Twilight already filled the hollow. The hill he was on curved and swelled around on his right until it bulked as a huge rough wall on the north. No doubt it was the graveyard of an ancient town—yes, he thought that among trees and bushes he could make out scars of excavation. To west and south the land lay more flat; but the Stallion River slanted across, thick growth of evergreens along its banks forming a windbreak. From the ridge Casiru looked over the iron-gray frozen stream to mile upon mile of snow tinged pink by the sun as it sank. Further down, his vision was hemmed in. However, the cursed whining wolfwind was likewise blocked, and the end of his journey in sight.

  Birches sheltered the buildings. These outlined a broad quadrangle which had been cobbled. Casiru believed he could identify shed, smokehouse, workshop, and stable, kennels, mews for the three kinds of animals the Rogaviki tamed. They were of undressed timber, sod-roofed, but well made. The dwelling filled an entire side of the court, long and wide though standing less high. This was because it was mainly underground, its carpentered walls a mere clerestory. Smoke rose from two of the several chimneys. On the south side, big, flat, black behind glass, tilted a sunpower collector made in Arvanneth. At the middle of the yard reared a skeletal windmill from some manufactory in Rahfd.

  Hounds roared forth to greet or challenge. They resembled their savage kin, tall, gaunt, gray. Breath exploded white from their fangs and frosted their muzzles. Zhano quieted them. A door opened in a dormer jutting from the house. Black against yellow light, a man bade the newcomers welcome.

  He led them down a ladder to a vestry, and thence to the principal chamber. Wood floors, carpeted with hides or imported fabrics, kept feet warm. Int
erior partitions were movable, grotesquely carved, gaudily painted. In the largest room, weapons blinked bright on whitewashed earthen walls, amidst stylized murals of creatures, plants, and natural forces. Shelves held hundreds of books; heat came from a Rahfdian stove whose tiles were delicately figured; Southland oil lamps shone from a dozen brackets. Among bundles of fruits and greens hung on the rafters were flower sachets to sweeten the air. As the travelers entered, a girl put aside a crook- backed stringed instrument on which she had been accompanying a song. Her last notes seemed to linger for a space, less wild than wistful.

  Folk sat crosslegged on ledges running around the floor, or on cushions by a low table. Present were Donya’s six children, ranging from Zhano to three-year- old Valdevanya; Zhano’s wife, staying here while he was away since thus far he was her sole husband; two of Donya’s men, counting Kyrian, the other two being off on expeditions of their own; four unwedded kinswomen, aged, middle-aged, young, half-grown; and Donya herself. Faces and bodies declared that all belonged to the Rogaviki. Else they showed little in common—certainly not dress or hair style, save that in this warmth they went either scantily clad or nude.

  Donya sprang from the platform where she had lain sprawled on a bearskin, to seize both Casiru’s hands. On her way, she quickly and passionately embraced Kyrian. “Welcome, friend.” Her husky voice stumbled a bit over the Southland words. “Eyach, wait!” she laughed. “Your pardon. I am out of practice.” Crossing wrists on bosom, bowing deep, she uttered a polite formula of the city. “O guest, may God the Indweller shine forth between us.”

  Half a smile twisted Casiru’s lips. “Scarcely when it’s me,” he said. “Have you forgotten in these past three years?”

  For a moment she grew grave, and picked her way phrase by phrase. “I remember ... you are a rascal, yes . . . yet trustworthy when you have reason to be. . . . And why have you come this far ... jouncing over ruts on a coach .. . rather than comfortable on a packet boat ... unless you need us . . . and we, maybe, need you?”

  Her regard of him was a steady searching. His of her was a probing, which touched her in passage around and around the room; but it had a thief’s intensity.

  She’d not changed much since she visited Arvanneth and they met. At thirty-five, she remained straight, her movements flowed and strength pounced in her grip. He could well see that, since tonight she wore a cloth kilt for its pockets, a necklace of shells and teeth, and a good deal of skin paint in red and blue loops. She was fuller-figured than most Rogaviki women, but muscles underlay each curve. Her breasts swelled milk-heavy; a mother among the Northfolk often gave suck for years after she gave birth, not just to her latest child but to siblings, or the children of friends, or even an adult who might want refreshment. Her countenance was striking, the oblique eyes gray-green, nostrils flared, mouth broad above a square chin. Wavy yellow-brown hair fell to her shoulders, clasped by a beaded headband. At this end of the dark season her color was luminous white; a few freckles crossed the blunt nose like ghosts of summer’s gold.

  “Come, sit, be at ease,” she invited. To her youngsters of intermediate age and to the spinsters she said a few words. They left. Obviously she had requested them to unload Casiru’s baggage and prepare food. But despite what study of Rogavikian he had done on his journey—and a Knife Brother in polyglot Arvanneth was a quick study, or he went under—he could not follow what she said. The same held true later on, whenever remarks passed between members of the family. At most, he caught single words here and there. He had heard of each kin-group evolving its own traditions, its very dialect; but the reality upset him.

  After all, when they met in the Southland city, he had taken her for a barbarian: intelligent, delightful company (in spite of refusing him her body, no matter how lickerish a reputation her people bore), but still the naive daughter of primitive hunters. Arvanneth, ancientest metropolis in the known world, was the labyrinth where subtleties and secrets dwelt. This man-empty North had no right to them!

  Accustomed to chairs, Casiru perched on the rim of a ledge, feet on floor. Donya smiled and put pillows behind him so he could sit back. She settled at his right. Yven, her first husband, took the left side. He was a couple of years her senior, leathery, eyes pale blue, close-cropped hair and beard streaked white through their sorrel. A tunic of foreign linen left bare a great scar on his thigh, where a bull he was hunting had gored him.

  Unoccupied members of the household disposed themselves on the rug. Their direct gaze betrayed interest, but they were as aloof, as reserved, as every civilized visitor had reported... . No, wait, Zhano and his girl-wife had gone out, arms around waists.... Donya’s six-year-old Lukeva brought glass goblets of hot mead on a tray. Casiru gratefully took one, warmed his palms on it, inhaled the fragrance, leaned his aches and saddle sores back into softness.

  “Would you rest a night before we talk about why you came?” Yven asked in surprisingly good Rahfdian. Maybe he made a trading trip yearly or biennially, southwest to the Khadrahad Valley, Casiru thought; or maybe he had mastered the language for war purposes—Donya had described how members of her kith joined in helping repel the Imperial invasion a decade ago, herself among them—or maybe both—“We will eat soon, and you can go straight after to your bed.”

  “Well, we’d best not confer at length before tomorrow,” Casiru said. He drank a mouthful, dry and herbal- pungent. “But a general idea—How have you fared here? What news?”

  “None for our folk as a whole,” Donya answered. She interlarded her hesitant Arvannethan with occasional Rahfdian, and frequently stopped to translate for the rest. “The seasons run their course. Among us, Valdevanya is new, not that you ever saw any of my family before. Likewise Kyrian. We married last winter solstice. Two years past, my third husband died, drowned fishing when his skiff capsized and he struck his head against it.”

  “I regret,” Casiru murmured.

  “We miss him,” Yven said.

  “Yes.” Donya let her sigh fade away, reached down to rumple Kyrian’s hair, and smiled at Yven across Casiru’s breast. “Folk lose, folk win; in the end, we give back to the land what it lent us. How has your life gone?”

  The city man shrugged. “Up and down, in and out, round and round, as ever. Until this fall, when Arvan- neth was conquered.”

  Donya leaned on an elbow, waiting. Fingers tightened about her goblet and a ripple ran beneath lamplit skin. Through windows gone dark came a lonesome hooting.

  “I would not think, from what I know of your kind, Casiru, that you suffered any real change,” said Yven slowly. “How many different masters has Arvanneth had, through how many thousands of years? And each believed he owned it, until time blew him away, and Arvanneth abided.”

  Casiru coughed out a chuckle. “And the Lairs were never touched, eh? My sort continued like the rats. Correct, more or less. Yet ... when ferrets come, woe betide the rats. I fear this is what’s happened.”

  He hunched forward. “Listen, I pray you. What have you heard in Hervar, farther north than navigation goes on the Jugular River? That the Empire of Rahfd marched eastward along the shores of the Dolphin Gulf, captured Arvanneth, and occupies it. You think: What’s that to you? The Southrons will still want metal. The trade will go on. Your kiths will wander free throughout their lands.

  “But I tell you, Donya, everybody among the North-folk, this is not the same as before. The Empire fell apart three hundred years ago. Its rebuilders are the Barommians, warriors from the highlands to the south of it. Their might and ambition are what menace us, you and me alike.

  “I own I expected no harm from the conquest. Rather, pickings should be fine for us Brothers while the turmoil lasted. But it’s been different. Ferrets indeed have been loosed in our tunnels. Growing desperate, I booked a seat on the first post coach of this year, under a false name. At the Agameh hostel I found a Rogaviki courier and paid him to bring you, my lady, a letter that said I was coming. Zhano and Kyrian kindly met me in Fuld. And here I am.�
��

  He stopped for breath and drank deep. The mead began buzzing in his weary head, as if the bees of a long-gone summer awoke to clover meadows.

  “Then ... you believe ... the Barommian lords of Rahfd mean to invade us next?” Yven inquired.

  “I am sure,” Casiru replied.

  Donya tossed back her cougar-hued locks. “Our oldest tales remember no time when Southrons did not want our country for plowland and pasture,” she said. “Whenever they tried, they got ruin. In my lifespan, we fought them on the Dusty Plains till they slunk back to their Khadrahad River; and they had Barommian leadership then too. If they cannot learn, well, let them troop through the Jugular Valley. The buzzards will be glad.”

  “I tell you, this captain who took Arvanneth is like none ever before him,” Casiru pleaded. “I understand you can’t act on my naked word. But come see, listen, feel, think for yourselves.”

  Donya’s eyes kindled. She had lived quietly of late, compared to her earlier farings. “Maybe,” she said low. “We will talk further.”

  They did, throughout the following month. Messengers brought heads of household from widely about, some even from kiths whose territories lay' beyond Hervar. They listened intently, conferred earnestly, agreed that in this business they and the Brotherhoods had a shared interest. Meanwhile Casiru enjoyed lavish material hospitality. Several unmarried women sought him in private, driven by a curiosity which was soon quenched. Yet no matter die politeness accorded him, he never saw below the surface of any person. Nor did he find any hope of mobilizing the Rogaviki. That concept did not exist for them. His attempted explanations glided straight off.

  When the ice melted on the Jugular and the first boat from Arvanneth docked at Fuld, he took a berth home on it. Donya promised she would investigate his warnings further. But a year went past before she seriously did.