The Many-Coloured Land Page 22

"Hell's bells, Aik! You are loaded!"

  "Say again, Chopper. Gimme your hand. Come on, don't be a poop. We're off!"

  Two yellow butterflies flew away from the Tanu dwelling and over the town of Roniah. They swooped above the workshops of potters and rooftile makers and weavers and carpenters and metalsmiths and boatwrights and armorers and glassblowers and sculptors. They intruded upon lapidaries and painters and basketmakers and rehearsing musicians; sipped nectar from the jasmine that bloomed beside swimming pools where pregnant women lounged and laughed; flew into an open-air school-room where a dozen blond, lissom children pointed their fingers in amazement and a startled Tanu teacher sent a dangerous query arrowing back toward Bormol's mansion.

  "To the docks!" Aiken ordered, and they flew toward the riverside. Broad flights of steps led down to a busy landing stage. Rama stevedores unloaded barges while human dock-hands and boatmen, many of them naked to the waist in the morning heat, went about their jobs or loafed in shady places waiting for some other man to finish his.

  The two butterflies landed atop a fat mooring bollard and turned back into Aiken and Raimo. One dockworker gave a shout. Seagulls rose up from the pavement and pilings, squawking an alarm. Aiken strolled off the bollard, leaving Raimo sitting there and blinking, and struck a pose in thin air. A burly bargee gave a shout of laughter and exclaimed, "Well, if it ain't Peter Pan himself! But you better send that there Tinker-bell back for a refit!"

  The dockside loafers roared. Up on the bollard, Raimo extended both of his arms to the side. His slanty-eyed Finnish face wore a crooked grin and a look of odd concentration. Immediately a dozen gulls fluttered down and aligned themselves from his wrists to his shoulders.

  "Hey, Aik! Shootin' gallery! Zap before crap or you lose!"

  The hovering little man in gold took aim with his forefinger. "Tarn!" he said. "Pam-pam-pammidy-pom!"

  Small flashes ran along Raimo's plaid-flanneled arms. He was engulfed in a cloud of smoke and fragmentary white feathers. The audience whistled and applauded while Raimo sneezed. "Attaway, li'l biddy buddy!"

  "And for my encore," Aiken cried, making a pass with both hands at the bollard itself, "I give you, shazooml"

  There was a sharp explosion. The heavy timbers of Raimo's perch disintegrated, leaving him suspended above the water wearing a look of pained surprise.

  "Was that nice?" the ex-forester expostulated. He floated over to the chuckling Aiken, grasped him by the epaulets of his golden suit, and suggested, "Maybe we should cool off with a swim!"

  The two airborne figures began to wrestle, bouncing low over the muddy yellow waters of the Rhône among the moored lighters and wherries and barges like wind-tossed carnival balloons. The men on the docks cackled and stamped, and terrified ramas dropped their burdens and covered their eyes.

  Enough!

  Creyn's mental command whipped out, hauling the two back to the quayside and depositing them onto the pavement with a painful jolt. Four attendants from Bormol's mansion stepped forward to take firm hold of the still snickering miscreants. With the fun clearly at an end, the dockworkers and boatmen began drifting back to their jobs.

  "I am programming mental restraints upon your major metapsychic functions until you have received proper training at the capital," Creyn said. "We'll have no more of this childish behavior."

  Aiken waved at Elizabeth, Bryan, and Sukey, who were being escorted down the quay stairs together with Stein on his litter.

  Raimo said, "Aw, Chief. How else we gonna learn what we can do?"

  Aiken added, "Lord Bormol told us last night to get right into it. And did we ever!" He winked at Sukey, who glared at him.

  Creyn said, "From now on, you'll do your learning in a controlled environment. Lord Bormol doesn't need you repaying his hospitality by destroying his wharf."

  The little man in gold shrugged. "Don't know my own strength yet is all. You want me to try putting that thing back together again?"

  Creyn's eyes, opaque blue in the sunlight, narrowed. "So you think you could? How very interesting. But I think we'll wait, Aiken Drum. It will be far safer for all of us if you stay on the leash for the time being."

  Elizabeth's thought came stealing gently along . . .

  So many wild talents you do have Aiken. What else is hidden in there? Let me look.

  She sent a probe boring into him. It caromed off a hastily erected but effective barrier.

  "Cut it out, Elizabeth!" Aiken cried aloud. "Quit or I'll fewkin' well zap you!"

  She regarded him sadly. "Would you, really?"

  "Well . . ." He hesitated, then gave her a lopsided smile. "Maybe not, sweetie-face. But I can't have you messing about with me, you know. Not even in fun. I'm not Stein . . . or Sukey, either."

  Creyn said, "Our boat is waiting for us at the end of the landing stage. We must be on our way." But as they all went down the dock, the Tanu man reached out to Elizabeth on a narrow-focus mode that spoke to her mind alone:

  Did you see how he did that?

  Primitive/effective. Even versus me unprepared. Concerned?

  Appalled actually.

  How effective torc restraint?

  Adequate now while he still unuse full potential. Later silver never suffice will seize gold. Educators face dilemma that one. May require termination. Not my decision Tanabe thanked.

  Capable vast mischief even when latent. Rare old human-type uncommon in Milieu: clown meddler.

  Type not unknown among Tanu alas. Predict kid smash hit Muriah. Query Muriah survive impact.

  Ironical just deserts to you slave masters. Humanity prey-perilous.

  Ah Elizabeth.

  Deny? Laugh. Manipucraftylators! Desocialization/re-socialization exiles shrewdly essayed. Example: castle environment anxietyprovoke. Follows party warmfriendshippower-sexgoodies. Reinforce lesson severed heads. Crude goodguy/badguy punish/reward terror/relief mindforming. Aiken + Raimo + (Sukey?) yours. Both Hunts victorious.

  How else integrate minimal delay? Some types e.g., Aiken superhazard.

  More like you than you?

  Perceptive Elizabeth. Angelic aloof overflyer despising pathetic exile misfits.

  "Ah, Elizabeth. We get to know one another better and better."

  The skipper who welcomed them to the unusual boat that would take them downriver wore khaki pants and a sweat-stained T-shirt. His belly overflowed his waistband. A crinkly peppered-salt mustache and fringe-beard bracketed the jovial smile on his mahogany face. He flicked Creyn a casual salute, one finger tapping the bill of a decrepit U.S. Navy cap of twentieth-century vintage.

  "Welcome aboard, milord and ladies and gents! Skipper Highjohn at your service. Take any pew you like, but the best view is up forward. Bring that stretcher over here and lash it to the tie-downs."

  The human travelers came onto the strange craft and settled somewhat apprehensively into the seats, which were pneumatically cushioned and form-fitting, with elaborate harnesses that the skipper helped them to fasten.

  "Is the river very rough, Captain?" Sukey inquired. She had positioned herself near Stein and kept darting uneasy glances at the sleeping giant while the attendants secured him with strong webbing.

  "Don't you be concerned. I've done this Rhône-Med run for sixteen years and never lost a boat." Highjohn flipped a lid on the chair arm and revealed a hidden container. "Little barf-bucket if you need it."

  Aiken piped up, "You may not have lost a boat, but how about a passenger?"

  "You look like you got a strong ticker, boy. If things get too wild for you, Lord Creyn will program a calmative into your torc. Everybody set now? We'll be stopping for lunch at Feligompo Plantation around noon for any of you who have appetites. Tonight we'll be at Darask, which is below the site of the future Avignon. You know, the place with the bridge. See you later."

  With a friendly wave, he went forward. The attendants from the mansion who had carried on Stein and their baggage now trooped ashore. Deckhands began scurrying about the vessel, prepari
ng it for castoff. The passengers watched with mingled interest and unease.

  The riverboat was similar in design to most of the others at the quayside, measuring about fourteen meters from its high, knife-sharp bow to its glutcally rounded stern. It was a distant cousin to the inflatable rafts and foldboats used by sportsmen and explorers on the whiter waters of the Galactic Milieu. The hull, stenciled on both sides with the name of the boat, Mojo, was a tough air-filled membrane with fat exterior corrugations and pillow-like fenders jutting out at regular intervals along the waterline. It looked as if it could be deflated and disassembled for shipment upstream via caravan. Tightly covered hatch openings fore and aft gave access to cargo holds, while the passenger accommodation was in an open area amidships that was arched over with a series of half-hoops. The dockworkers quickly covered this frame with panels of deeply tinted transparent film resembling decamole. When the last section of the bubbletop was sealed, an air blower began to operate inside the boat, providing ventilation for the occupants and rendering the waterproof canopy rigid.

  Sukey turned to Elizabeth, who sat in the seat beside her. "I didn't like the way the Captain talked. What are we getting into?"

  "An interesting ride, at any rate, if the signs and portents add up. Bryan, do you know anything at all about the River Rhône?"

  "It was all cut up with dams and locks and bypass channels in our time," the anthropologist replied. "The gradient is probably a lot steeper here in the Pliocene, so there are bound to be rapids. When we approach the Avignon region about a hundred-fifty kloms south of here, we'll be in an area that very likely has a deep gorge. In the twenty-second century it was stoppered by the Donzere-Mondragon Barrage, one of the largest dam projects in Europe. What we'll find down there now . . . well, it can't be too bad or they wouldn't try to navigate it, would they?"

  Aiken uttered a shaky laugh. "Good question. Well, ready or not, guys, we're off to the races."

  A rather stout telescoping mast was rising up behind the passenger compartment. When it reached its full height of four meters, the top section opened to disgorge a boom with a roller sail, looking for all the world like an old-fashioned portable movie screen. The sail unfurled and gave a few tentative swiveling motions. Deckhands cast off the boat's mooring warps, and vibration in the deck betokened the operation of a small auxiliary engine. The Mojo began threading in and out of the other shore traffic on its way to the mainstream, leading Bryan to deduce that it must utilize more than one rudder for maximum maneuverability.

  They angled sharply away from the shore. As the current took them, the walled city of Roniah fell away astern with amazing swiftness. It was not easy to estimate their speed, since they were a good two hundred meters from either shore; but Bryan guessed that the sediment-laden flood was racing along at a minimum of twenty knots. What would happen when this great volume of water was compressed between high rock walls farther downstream challenged the imagination of the anthropologist. His speculations were of a decidedly queasy sort.

  Raimo, in the seat next to him, had found his own brand of solace. He took a pull from his replenished silver flask and offered it to Bryan rather half-heartedly. "Tanu popskull. Hardly Hudson's Bay standard, but not too bad."

  "Maybe later," Bryan said, smiling Raimo grunted and took another swallow. The euphoria of his morning adventure had faded away, leaving the ex-forester brooding and ill at ease. Bryan tried to draw Raimo out with questions about the previous night's revelry but received only the curtest replies.

  "You hadda be there," Raimo said, and lapsed into silence.

  For nearly an hour they moved easily through a wide bluff-sided channel, the forested foothills of the Alps on their left hand and arid tablelands rising above the near-jungle of the humid bottoms on the right. Occasionally, Creyn pointed out the location of a plantation; but the threes were so thick that it was impossible to see any details of the settlements ashore. They glimpsed smaller boats plying the shallows and once they overhauled a long covered barge riding deep in the water, bare-masted and having only a small bubble over the midships steersman's cockpit. The bargee greeted them with a toot from his airhorn, to which Skipper Highjohn responded with a syncopated blast of his own.

  The river made a wide curve and the channel passed between a tall headland and a group of craggy islets. Small mechanical sounds announced the furling of their sail, the boom's folding, and the withdrawal of the telescoping mast back into its housing. Far from losing speed, the boat moved along faster rounding the point. It seemed to Bryan that they must be making thirty knots or more. Simultaneously he became aware of a deep vibration transmitted by the water through the sealed hull of the boat, the inflated headrest of his seat, and the very bones of his skull. The vibration increased to an audible roar as the boat came charging around a sharp bend. The walls of a canyon rose on both sides.

  Sukey screamed and Raimo yelped an obscenity.

  Ahead of them the narrowing Rhône slanted downhill at a one-in-five gradient, the river lashed to a foaming frenzy by the rocks of its tilted bed. The boat seemed to dive into the rapids and a great avalanche of ochre water crashed over the canopy and temporarily engulfed them. Then Mojo broke free and came to the surface, planing along among monstrous standing waves and granite boulders, rolling so steeply that yellow water climbed halfway up the watertight bubble first on one side, then on the other. The noise was almost insupportable. Raimo's mouth was wide open but his yells went unheard amidst the uproar of the cascading Rhône.

  A dark mass loomed ahead. The boat heeled nearly sixty degrees to starboard as they went whipping around a tall rock pinnacle into a crooked slot between files of huge boulders. The air was so filled with flying spume that it seemed impossible that their skipper could see where he was going. Nevertheless the boat continued to zig and zag among the rocks with only an occasional bump against the pneumatic fenders.

  A respite came in the form of a deep cut where the river flowed free. But the voice of Highjohn called, "One last time, folks!" and Bryan realized that they were rocketing through the defile toward a veritable fence of sharp crags, fanglike chunks of broken granite against which the yellow river waters crashed in overlapping curtains of spray. There seemed to be no way through. The stunned time-travelers gripped the arms of their seats and braced for the inevitable impact.

  Mojo raced toward the tallest of the rocks, pitching violently. It crashed into the foam, but instead of hitting solid rock or sinking, it rose higher and higher on some unseen surge. There was a thrumming blow against the port side as they bounced off a rock face, completely drowned in the opaque pother. The boat seemed to roll a full 360 degrees and then wallow free to sail through the air. It landed with a bone-jarring impact, water closing again over the top of the canopy. Almost immediately it popped to the surface, floating in complete tranquility across a broad pool that spread between low walls. Behind them was the cut they had just traversed, spewing a horsetail cataract, like the outflow of a titanic drain, into the basin thirty meters below.

  "You can unfasten your safety belts now, folks," the skipper said. "That'll be all the cheap thrills for this morning. After lunch, it really gets rough."

  He came back into the passenger compartment to check the canopy for possible leakage. "Didn't take in a drop!"

  "'Congratulations," whispered Bryan. With one trembling hand be fumbled with the buckles of the harness.

  "Give you a hand?" suggested Highjohn, bending over to help.

  Released, Bryan rose weakly to his feet. He saw that all the others, including Creyn and Elizabeth, were motionless in their seats, eyes closed, apparently asleep.

  Fists on hips, the rivermen surveyed the passengers with a slow shake of his head. "Every goddam time. These sensitive Tanu types just can't take Cameron's Sluice, being afraid of water as they mostly are. So they zonk out. And if the torc-wearing humans show any distress, the Tanu just program a zonk for them, too. Kinda disappointing, you know? Every artist likes to have an aud
ience."

  "I take your point," Bryan said.

  "I don't often get a rarey like you, no torc and all and man enough to come through it without a case of the yammering fantods. This lady without the torc", he pointed to Elizabeth, "must have just fainted away."

  "Not likely," Bryan said. "She's an operant metapsychic. I dare say she just did her own calming mental exercise and napped through the excitement, just as Creyn did."

  "But not you, eh, sport? I suppose you've been on rough water before."

  Bryan shrugged. "Hobby sailor. North Sea, Channel, Med. The usual thing."

  Highjohn clapped him on the shoulder. His eyes twinkled and he gave Bryan a comradely smile. "Tell you what. You come on forward with me and I'll show you a thing or three about driving this tub before we reach Feligompo. If you enjoy it, who knows? There's lots worse jobs you could settle into in this Exile."

  "I'd enjoy riding with you in the wheelhouse," Bryan said, "but I won't be able to take you up on your offer of an apprenticeship." He grinned ruefully. "I believe the Tanu have other plans for me."

  Chapter Thirteen

  Claude awoke. A cool breeze blew through hanging strings of wooden beads that screened all four sides of the prisoners' dormitory and kept insects from flying in. Two guards paced around and around outside the shelter, bronze helmets turning as they scanned the inmates, compound bows strung and ready, resting lightly on their shoulders where they could be drawn in an instant.

  The old man tested his limbs, and by God, they worked. His field adaptation system was still Go after all the years. He sat up on his pallet and looked around. Almost all of the other prisoners were still lying as though drugged. But Felice was up, and Basil the Alpine climber, and the two Japanese ronin. Faint yapping sounds came from a closed basket next to a sleeping woman. There were snores and a few moans from the other sleepers.

  Claude quietly watched Felice. She was talking in low tones with the three other men. Once one of the ronin tried to protest something she was saying. She cut him short with a fierce gesture and the Oriental warrior subsided.