Pliocene Exile - The Adversary Part 28

Build Guderiandevice. They can if Aiken helps.

Marc will do utmost prevent it.

Children 5tons Milieu weapons + aircraft hope win. Aiken says Marcweaker him.

My G.o.d What do? WHAT? We giveup aircraft Lowlifefreedomhope doomed-Elizabeth help us tell us what do!

I don't know Basil I must consider so many factors now this be patient obey Aiken for now I'll contact you via intimode thoughtbeam after I have time think time think O G.o.d an open gate!

Elizabeth do one thing.

Yes Basil?

Tell PeopeoMoxmoxBurke HiddenSprings.

... Verywell. But there is little chance his people can get to aircraft hidden Alps ahead Aikensponsored groupNonono DON'T ask him try that! No. Tell him opengate.

Help him resolve inaction/dilemma/fear.

Peo fear?

Peo?

Elizabeth you meditated BlackCrag long while we waited hoping advice. None. Aircraftscheme seemed onlyhope protect Lowlives Firvulag&Aiken freedomthreat. Peo wanted use aircraft invade Roniah obtain Milieuweaponry for deterrent. We almost ready to when Nodonn came.

Now ... what now? What hope? Can you not advise?

Basil I don't know what Aiken plans or Marc. Firvulag will continue brushfirewar pattern at least until Truce.

I cannot advise Peo anymore than you. Not yet.

Tell him opengate.

Open gate ... You think Peo weary struggle would return Milieu?

He might. Others certainly would now aircrafthope gone.

And you Basildear would you go?

I have not climbed my mountain.

Ah. Pliocene Everest. I remember Peo must know opengate. All humans must. To decide.

Even you.

Forgive me Elizabeth. I will wait your call. Goodbye.

Goodbye Basil.

CHAPTER NINE.

No breath of air stirred in the nursery, for even though the sun had set, stagnant summer air still pressed upon the chalet like a fat sweaty hand. Elizabeth, standing at the open window and rapt in fa.r.s.ensing, was oblivious, her bare arms stiffly extended, pale and sheened with moisture. As if to armour herself for the ordeal, she had dressed in a beltless Tanu gown of black peau de cygne with a yoke and pendant ribands of jewel-encrusted scarlet: Brede's colours.

The waiting lengthened. Minanonn endured imperturbably, lost in his own thoughts; but Brother Anatoly's indignation grew along with his physical discomfort as the suffering baby wailed.

Finally Mary-Dedra lifted the child from his waterbed basket and held him against her shoulder, rocking, torc to torc, sharing the pain she could not diminish.

Anatoly could bear it no longer. He sprang up from his stool in the corner of the room and went to Minanonn. "This is monstrous," he whispered. "You're a coercer. Help that poor woman and her child! At least take the baby down out of his pain-"

"He must be fully alert for the procedure. Dedra understands."

"Then get on with it!" the priest blurted. "What's Elizabeth playing at, for heaven's sake? Call her back here!"

"She would not have responded to the farspoken summons if it had not been important," Minanonn said. "Calm yourself and remember your own duty."

Stung, Anatoly turned away from the exotic and hurried to Mary-Dedra. It was she who had requested his presence at the operation, not the aloof Grand Master, who had barely acknowledged his existence since he had taken up residence in the chalet eight days earlier. The former Maribeth Kelly-Dakin, who had been a gold-torc protegee of Mayvar Kingmaker, now served as executive housekeeper of Black Crag. As Anatoly laid a hand on her hybrid baby's head, she managed to smile.

"I'm glad of the delay, Brother. It'll be even worse for poor Brendan when Elizabeth and Minanonn start. That's why I asked you to be here. For my sake."

Anatoly withdrew his hand from the child convulsively, as if he had been burned. "But if he's a black-torc-" he started to say, and then caught himself and expostulated, "Elizabeth and the redactors should be doing their best to ease his pain-not aggravate it with some h.e.l.lish experiment! Dedra, how can you let them do this?"

The woman closed her eyes and tears started from beneath the lids. The child wailed in grating monotony, clinging to his mother. He was beautiful, blond, and long-limbed; only the unnatural flush about his extremities and the hot blisters beneath his miniature golden torc betraying his impending fate.

Dedra said, "You don't understand, Brother. Brendan presents a unique opportunity for Elizabeth. Perhaps it's providential-or at least synchronicitous!-that he should have failed to adapt to the torc. The syndrome afflicts other babies, too, you know. But all of the others except Brendan are pureblooded Tanu." Her eyes opened and held those of the old priest. "You've been here in the Pliocene for a long time. Surely you know about the problem."

"If they didn't torc the children in the first place, there'd be no maladaptation!"

"And no metapsychic powers." Dedra's tear-streaked face was amazingly ironic. "I never realized what the metas had when I lived in the Milieu. When I came here, and the Tanu tests showed I had strong latencies, and they said they were giving me a torc-I was afraid. Now, I would rather die than give it up."

"And this is the price," Anatoly said, nodding at the child.

"Was it worth it, Dedra?"

She lifted her chin. "Somewhere, millions of light-years away, there's a whole galaxy full of torced people who think it's worth it. Why don't you judge them, Brother?"

"I'm sorry I was so crude." He shrugged. "I was never much of a theologian-just a poor fool of an apparatchik from Yakutsk who decided in a rash moment to make the Pliocene my parish ... But tell me why you think little Brendan's case is a unique opportunity."

"Hybrid children aren't supposed to go black-torc. Neither are offspring of the Thagdal. Brendan's both"-her arms tightened about the whimpering infant-"and you can see that he's got the d.a.m.ned syndrome in spades. We don't know why. Elizabeth tried to help Tanu black-torc babies when she lived in Muriah, but she had no success. Her failure was as much due to the exotic circuitry of their minds as to the complexity of the problem. But my Brendan, with his hybrid mind, is more familiar territory. Elizabeth has been mullocking about in him ever since he came down with the sickness a month ago, trying things."

Dedra's eyes shut again and fresh tears came. Brother Anatoly looked at his sandalled feet and waited for her to compose herself. Finally she said, "Poor Brendan is special in another way. Most black-torc children die of the thing within two or three weeks. My baby's tougher. Hybrids often are."

"Then there is hope?"

The baby wailed more loudly and Dedra swayed, rocking him.

She had turned toward Elizabeth, who stood still at the window, facing the distant Pyrenees, pink with alpenglow above the hazeblurred landscape of Haut Languedoc.