The Call of Earth Read online

  "We don't have the Index," Luet pointed out.

  "No, but we are bound to the Oversoul with threads of gold and silver," said Nafai, glancing at Hushidh. "That should be enough, shouldn't it?"

  "Speak for us then, Luet," said Hushidh.

  So Luet spoke their questions, and then spoke aloud her own worries, and those Nafai had expressed, and the terror Hushidh had experienced. It was to that question that the first answer came.

  I don't know, said the Oversoul.

  Luet fell silent, startled.

  "Did you hear what I heard?" asked Nafai.

  Since no one knew what Nafai had heard, no one could answer. Until Hushidh dared to say the thing she had heard inside her mind. "She doesn't know," whispered Hushidh.

  Nafai gripped their hands tighter, and spoke to the Oversoul, his voice now and not Luet's speaking for them all. "What don't you know?"

  I sent the dream of the gold and silver threads, said the Oversoul. I sent the dream of Issib and the children at the door of the tent. But I never meant you to see the general. I never showed you the general.

  "And the ... the rats?" asked Hushidh.

  "And the angels?" asked Luet.

  I don't know where they came from or what they mean.

  "So," said Hushidh. "It was just a strange chance dream in your mind, Luet. And then because you told your dream it became a memory in my mind, and that's it."

  No!

  It was as if the Oversoul had shouted into her mind, and Hushidh shuddered under the force of it.

  "What, then!" cried Hushidh. "If you don't know where it came from, how do you know that it isn't just an ordinary frightening dream?"

  Because the general had it too.

  They looked at each other in amazement.

  "General Moozh?"

  To Hushidh's mind there came a fleeting image of a man with a flying creature on his shoulder, and a giant rat dinging to his leg, and many people-humans, rats, and angels-approaching, touching the three of them, worshipping. As quickly as it came, the image receded.

  "The general saw this dream?" asked Hushidh.

  He saw it. Weeks ago. Before any of you dreamed of these creatures.

  "Three of us then," said Luet. "Three of us, and we have never met the general, and he has never met us, and yet we all dreamed of these creatures. He saw worship, and I saw art, and you saw war, Hushidh, war and salvation."

  "If it didn't come from you, Oversold," said Nafai, urgently pressing the question, holding tightly to their hands. "If it didn't come from you, then where could such a dream have come from?"

  I don't know.

  "Is there some other computer?" asked Hushidh.

  Not here. Not in Harmony.

  "Maybe you just didn't know about it," suggested Nafai.

  I would have known.

  "Then why are we having these dreams?" demanded Nafai.

  They waited, and there was no answer. And then there nw an answer, but one that they did not wish for.

  I'm afraid, said the Oversoul.

  Hushidh felt the fear return to her own heart, and she gripped her sister's hand more tightly, and Nafai's hand as well. "I hate this," said Hushidh. "I hate it. I didn't want to know it."

  I'm afraid, said the Oversoul, as clear as speech in Hushidh's mind-and, she hoped, in the minds of the other two as well. I'm afraid, for fear is the name I have for uncertainty, for impossibility that is nevertheless real. Yet I also have a hope, for that is another name for the impossible that might be real. I have a hope that what you have been given is from the Keeper of Earth.

  That across these many lightyears the Keeper of Earth is reaching out to us.

  "Who is the Keeper of Earth?" asked Hushidh.

  "The Oversoul has mentioned it before," said Nafai. "It's never been clear, but I think it's a computer that was set up as guardian of Earth when our ancestors left forty million years ago."

  Not a computer, said the Oversoul.

  "What is it then?" asked Nafai.

  Not a machine.

  "What, then?"

  Alive.

  "What could possibly be alive after all these years?"

  The Keeper of Earth. Calling to us. Calling to you. Maybe my desire to bring you back to Earth is also a dream from the Keeper. I have also been confused, and did not know what I should do, and then ideas came into my mind. I thought they were the result of the randomizer routines. I thought they were from my programming. But if you and Moozh can dream strange dreams of creatures never known in this world, can't I also be given thoughts that were never programmed into me, that do not come from anything in this world?

  They had no answer for the Oversoul's question.

  "I don't know about you," said Hushidh, "but I was definitely counting on the Oversoul to be in charge of everything, and I really don't like the idea of her not knowing what's going on."

  "Earth is calling to us," said Nafai. "Don't you see? Earth is calling to us. Calling the Oversoul, but not just the Oversoul. Us. Or you two, anyway, and Moozh. Calling you to come home to Earth."

  Not Moozh, said the Oversoul.

  "How do you know, not Moozh?" asked Hushidh. "If you don't know why or how or even whether the Keeper of Earth gave us these dreams, then how do you know that Moozh is not supposed to come out onto the desert with us?"

  Not Moozh, said the Oversoul. Leave Moozh alone.

  "If you didn't mean Moozh to join us, then why did you bring him here?" asked Nafai.

  I brought him here, but not for you.

  "He has the same gold and silver threads as we do," said Luet. "And the Keeper of Earth has spoken to him."

  I brought him here to destroy Basilica.

  "That tears it," said Nafai. "That really tears it. The Oversoul has one idea. The Keeper of Earth has another. And what are we supposed to do?"

  Leave Moozh alone. Don't touch him. He's on his own path.

  "Right," said Nafai. "A minute ago you tell us that you don't know what's going on, and now we're supposed to take your word for it that Moozh isn't part of what we're doing! We're not puppets, Oversoul! Do you understand me? If you don't know what's going on, then why should we follow your orders in this? How do you know you're right, and we're wrong?"

  I don't know.

  "Then how do you know I shouldn't go to him and ask him to come with us?"

  Because he's dangerous and terrible and he might use you and destroy you and I can't stop him if he decides to do it.

  "Don't go," said Luet.

  "He's one of us," said Nafai. "If our purpose is a good one in the first place, then it's a good one because there's something right about us, the people that the Oversoul has bred, going back to Earth. If it's good it's good because the Keeper of Earth is calling us."

  "Whatever sent me that terrible dream," said Hushidh, "I don't know if it's good or not."

  "Maybe the dream was a warning," said Nafai. "Maybe there's some danger we'll face, and the dream was warning you."

  "Or maybe the dream was a warning for you to stay away from Moozh," said Luet.

  "How in the world could the dream possibly mean that ?" he asked. He was shucking off the odd clothing he had thrown on in a hurry a short while before, and dressing seriously now, dressing to go out into the city.

  "Because that's what I want it to mean," said Luet, and suddenly she was crying. "You've only been my husband for half a night, and suddenly you want to go to a man that the Oversoul says is dangerous and terrible, and for what? To invite him to come out into the desert? To invite him to give up his armies and his kingdoms and his blood and violence and travel with us in the desert on a journey that will somehow end with us on Earth? He'll kill you, Nafai! Or imprison you and keep you from coming with us. I'll lose you"

  "You won't," said Nafai. "The Oversoul will protect me."

  "The Oversoul warned you not to go. If you disobey ..."

  "The Oversoul won't punish me because the Over-soul doesn't even know that I'm not ri
ght. The Oversoul will bring me back to you because the Oversoul wants me with you almost as much as I want me with you."

  I don't know if I can protect you.

  "Yes, well, there's an awful lot that you don't know," said Nafai. "I think you've made that clear to us tonight. You're a very powerful computer and you have the best intentions in the world, but you don't know what's right any more than I do. You don't know whether all your plans for Moozh might have been influenced by the Keeper of Earth, do you-you don't know whether the Keeper's plan is for me to do exactly what I'm doing, and let your plot to destroy Basilica go hang. To destroy Basilica, of all things! It's your chosen city, isn't it? You've brought together all the people who are closest to you in this one place, and you want to destroy it?"

  I brought them together to create you, foolish children. Now I'll destroy it to spread my people out again throughout the world. So that whatever influence I have left in this world will reach into every land and nation. What is the city of Basilica, compared to the world?

  "The last time you talked that way, I killed a man," said Nafai.

  "Please," said Luet. "Stay with me."

  "Or let me come with you," said Hushidh.

  "Not a chance," said Nafai. "And Lutya, I will come back to you. Because the Oversoul will protect me."

  I don't know if I can.

  "Then do your best," said Nafai. With that he was out the door and gone.

  "They'll arrest him the minute he tries to go anywhere in the street," said Hushidh.

  "I know," said Luet. "And I understand why he's doing it, and it's a brave thing to do, and I even think it's the right thing to do, and I don't want him to do it"

  Luet wept, and now it was Hushidh's turn to hold and comfort her. What a dance this has been tonight, she thought. What a wedding night for you, what a night of dreams for me. And now, what morning will it be? You could be left a widow without even his child inside you. Or-why not?-the great general Moozh might come with Nafai, renounce his army, and disappear with us into the desert. Anything could happen. Anything at all.

  IN GABALLUFIX'S HOUSE, AND NOT IN A DREAM

  Moozh spread out his map of the Western Shore on Gaballufix's table, and let his mind explore the shape of things. The Cities of the Plain and Seggidugu were spread out before him like a banquet. It was hard to guess which way to move. By now they all must have heard that a Gorayni army held the gates of Basilica. No doubt the hotheads in Seggidugu were urging a quick and brutal response, but they would not prevail-the northern border of Seggidugu was too close to the main Gorayni armies in Khlam and Ulye. It would take so many soldiers to take Basilica, even if they knew there were only a thousand Gorayni to defend it, that it would leave Seggidugu vulnerable to counterstrike.

  Indeed, many faint hearts in Seggidugu would already be wondering if it might not be best to come before the Imperator now, as supplicants, begging him to take their nation under his beneficent protection. But Moozh was sure that these would have no more luck than the hotheads. Instead the coolest minds, the most careful men would prevail. They would wait and see. And that was what Moozh was counting on.

  In the Cities of the Plain, there was no doubt already a movement afoot to revive the old Defense League, which had driven off the Seggidugu invaders nine times. But that was more than a thousand years ago, when the Seggidugu had first stormed over the mountains from the desert; it was unlikely that more than a few of the cities would unite, and even in supposed unity they would be quarreling and stealing from each other and weakening each other more than if each stood alone.

  What was in Moozh's power to make happen? At this moment, if he sent a delegation with a sternly worded demand for the surrender of the nearest cities, they would no doubt receive quick compliance. But the refugees would gout out of those cities like blood from a heart-wound, and the other Cities of the Plain would unite then. They might even ask Seggidugu to lead them, and in that case Seggidugu might well act.

  Instead he might demand Seggidugu's surrender. If they complied, then the Cities of the Plain would all roll over and play dead. But it was too big a gamble, if he could find a better way. He really could force the surrender of any one or even two of the Cities of the Plain, but he had far too few men-and far too tenuous a link with the main Gorayni armies-to make his ultimatum stick if Seggidugu decided to defy him. Great wars had been avoided, great empires had been created by just such dangerous bluffs, and Moozh was not afraid to take the chance if there was no better way.

  And if there was a better way, he would have to find it soon. By now the Imperator himself would know that both Plod and the intercessor assigned to Moozh's army had been killed-by a Basilican assassin, of course, but no one had been able to question him because Moozh had killed the man with his own hands. Then Moozh took off with a thousand men and no one knew where he was. That bit of news would strike terror into the heart of the Imperator, for he knew quite well how fragile the power of a ruler is, when his best generals become too popular. The Imperator would be wondering how many of his own men would flock to Moozh if he raised a flag of rebellion in the mountains; and how many others, too loyal to defect, would nevertheless be terrified to fight against the greatest general of the Gorayni. All these fears would prompt the Imperator to put his armies in motion, and to have them moving south and west, knowing Khlam and Ulye.

  All well and good... that would frighten the Seggidugu even more, and increase the chance that bluffing them into submission might work. And these army movements would not get far before the next news reached the Imperator-that Moozh's bold movement had succeeded brilliantly, that the fabled city of Basilica was now in Gorayni hands.

  Moozh smiled in pleasure at the thought of how that news would strike terror in the hearts of all the courtiers who had been whispering to the Imperator that Moozh was a traitor. A traitor? A man who has the wit and courage to take a city with a thousand men? To march past two powerful enemy kingdoms and take a mountain fortress perched in their rear? What kind of traitor is this? the Imperator would ask.

  But still, he would be afraid, for boldness in his generals always terrified him. Especially boldness in Vozmuzhalnoy Vozmozhno. So the Imperator would send him a legate or two-certainly an intercessor, probably a new friend, and also a couple of close and trusted family members. They would not have the authority to overrule Moozh-the Gorayni would never have conquered so many kingdoms if the imperators had allowed their underlings to countermand the orders of generals in the field. But they would have the ability to interfere, to question, to protest, to demand explanations, and to send word back to the Imperator of anything they didn't like.

  When would these legates arrive? They would have to take the same desert route that Moozh had taken with his men. But now that road would be closely watched by Seggidugu and Izmennik, so there would have to be a ponderous bodyguard, and supply wagons, and many scouts and tents and all sorts of livestock. Thus the legates would have neither the desire nor the ability to move even half as quickly as Moozh's army had moved. So it would be at least a week before they arrived, probably longer. But when they came, they would have many soldiers-perhaps as many as Moozh had already brought-and these soldiers would almost certainly not be men who had fought under Moozh, men he had trained, men he could count on.

  A week. Moozh had at least a week in which to set in motion the course he was going to follow. He could try his bluff against Seggidugu now, and risk deep humiliation if he was defied-the Cities of the Plain would certainly unite against him then, and he'd soon be defending Basilica from a siege. This would not lead to his ouster as general, but it would take the luster off his name, and it would put him back under the thumb of the Imperator. These last few days had been so delicious, not to have to play the games of deception and subterfuge that consumed half his life when he had to deal with a friend appointed by the Imperator, not to mention some career-advancing, meddlesome intercessor. Moozh had killed relatively few people with his own hands, but
he certainly relished the memory of those deaths-the surprise on their faces, the exquisite relief that Moozh felt then. Even the necessity of killing that good soldier of Basilica, Smelost, even that did not take away the sheer joy of his new freedom.

  Am I ready?

  Am I ready to make the move of my life, to strike in vegeance against the Imperator in the name of Pravo Gollossa? To risk all on my ability to unite Basilica, Seggidugu, and the Cities of the Plain, along with every Gorayni soldier who will follow me and whatever support we can eke out from Potokgavan?

  And if I am not ready for that, am I ready to set my neck back into the collar that the Imperator forces all his generals to wear? Am I ready to bow to the will of God's incarnation here on Harmony? Am I ready to wait years, decades for an opportunity that may never be closer than it is right now?

  He knew the answer even as he asked the question. Somehow he must turn this week, this day, this hour into his opportunity, his chance to bring down the Gorayni and replace their cruel and brutal empire with a generous and democratic one, led by the Sotchitsiya, whose vengeance was long delayed but not one whit less sure for all that. Here Moozh stood with an army-a small one, but his -in the city that symbolized all that was weak and effete and cringing in the world. I longed to destroy you, Basilica, but what if instead I make you strong? What if I make you the center of the world-but a world ruled by men of power, not these weak and cringing women, these politicians and gossips and actors and singers. What if the greatest story told about Basilica was not that it was the city of women, but that it was the city of the Sotchitsiya ascendancy?

  Basilica, you city of women, your husband is here for you, to master you and teach you the domestic arts that you have so long forgotten.

  Moozh looked again at Bitanke's list of names. If he was looking for someone to rule Basilica in the name of the Imperator, then he would have to choose a man as consul: One of Wetchik's sons, if they could be found, or perhaps Rashgallivak himself, or some weaker man who might be propped up by Bitanke.

  But if Moozh wanted to unite Basilica and the Cities of the Plain and Seggidugu as well against the Imperator, then what he needed was to become a citizen of Basilica by marriage, and to gain a place for himself at the head of the city; he needed, not a consul, but a bride.