Gods and Pawns (Company) Read online

  “…enough slaves to make the trip to the coast again, with sledges to bring back stones…”

  Signs of an old infestation, long healed. At some point in the past Agueybana had suffered from liver fluke, but made a full recovery. And seemed, overall, quite robust now. Therefore…nobody was eating the cresses? Or the fish? Perhaps the pond was merely ornamental. But…

  “…glad you agree with me!” Agueybana was saying, and thumped him on the back with painful heartiness. “It’s damned annoying to be the only level-headed person in the place, but there you are. Lord Maketaurie will sympathize, I’m sure. Tell me…has he an army?”

  “I’m sorry?” Lewis came alert. “An army? Oh, no, great one. Why would the ruler of the afterlife need an army?”

  “Hm. I hadn’t thought of that,” said Agueybana, pulling at his lip. “Pity. It might have come in useful. Oh, well. You present my terms, anyway, understand? And I’ll see to it your master receives good report of you.”

  “You are too kind,” said Lewis, genuflecting.

  He was lying down on one of the two ancient cots when Mendoza entered their room, carrying another platter of guavas.

  “I headed off our hostess,” she said. “Told her the dead need a little peace and quiet now and then. My God, Lewis, you look exhausted.”

  “I’ve been lying like a Facilitator all day,” said Lewis dully. “But I’m nearly done with the east wing of the palace.”

  “Bloody lazy mortal aristocrats,” said Mendoza, setting down the platter. “I’m surprised they didn’t make the child do it. They make her do everything else.”

  Lewis sat up and reached for a guava. “They don’t have liver flukes, by the way. I scanned. No parasites at all.”

  “None?” Mendoza looked suspicious. “But that fish pond is crawling with the stuff. It’s in the snails and the fish. It’s encysted on the watercress. Lewis, we’ve got a tiny inbred colony of primates living together here on one hilltop. They ought to be loaded with fleas and lice and—just about every nasty parasite mortals can get.”

  “They’re not, however,” said Lewis, peeling the guava. “Odd, isn’t it?”

  “Distinctly odd. By the way…I don’t suppose you’d do me a favor?”

  “I’d be happy to. What is it?”

  “Since you don’t seem to mind talking to them…I wonder if you could sort of indirectly bring up the subject of plant composting in the garden, and ask them what their recipe is?”

  “But I thought you discovered that,” said Lewis, bewildered.

  “No. I spent all day analyzing samples I took from the bottom of the chute—when I wasn’t weeding their damn terrace paths and herb beds. Fish bones, broken pots, vegetable matter, mortal sewage. And something else. Some batch of microorganisms I could not, for the life of me, identify, but which is able to convert stinking muck into black gold.”

  “All right,” said Lewis, mentally adding another to the long list of things for which the greatest delicacy and tact was needed. “Rely on me.”

  “Thanks,” said Mendoza. She threw herself down on her bed, which promptly collapsed in a tangle of rotten wood and cord. With explosive profanity she rose and kicked it across the room, where it broke into bits with a sound like old bones shattering.

  Lewis rose at once. “You can have mine.”

  “No! No, sweetheart. All I had to do for the wretched monkeys all day was weed their little plague-spot of a garden. They worked you a lot harder. You stay there,” said Mendoza, controlling her temper with difficulty.

  “Oh, I couldn’t—” said Lewis dazedly, the word sweetheart pounding in his ears.

  “No. Hell, you know what I’ll do? I’ll just see if I can’t sleep standing up.” Mendoza surveyed the room and found a patch of wall that was slightly less leprous with moss than the rest. She leaned against it, and balanced herself cautiously. “What’s it called, going into fugue? If those old field ops can do it, I’ll bet I can do it, too.”

  “It takes a little practice,” said Lewis. “You have to sort of open your consciousness. The opposite of focusing, you see? Just…reach out into the Everything.”

  “So you’ve done this before?” Mendoza let her arms hang down, decided that was uncomfortable, and folded them instead.

  “A little,” Lewis admitted. “I had climbed a tree to get out of a flood. On the third day I was up there, I tried going into fugue, so I could get some rest.”

  “Did it work?”

  “Yes…though I wouldn’t call it a success. I found myself identifying entirely too closely with my tree. Next thing I knew, I was having a furious conversation with a family of gall-wasps. Had this overpowering urge to rub insect repellent on myself for months afterward.”

  “Ugh.” Mendoza shuddered and closed her eyes.

  Lewis peeled and ate another guava.

  Mendoza opened her eyes.

  “Wait a minute. These people survived an epidemic that wiped out the rest of their civilization. You don’t suppose they’ve got some kind of genetic resistance to parasites in general? And, therefore, maybe, to certain diseases transmitted by the parasites?”

  “Possibly,” said Lewis, struck by the idea. He looked at her. “Interesting! But…you know, if you want to go into fugue, you need to stop thinking about anything specific.”

  “Oh. Right,” said Mendoza, and closed her eyes again. “Well, good night, Lewis.”

  “Good night.”

  He ate one more guava, slowly, wondering why the mortals he’d scanned hadn’t so much as a flea bite among them. What if they, alone of all their people, had some genetic characteristic that helped their ancestors survive an epidemic? He knew that Native Americans were dying, in the millions, of smallpox and other European diseases. They died, not because they were especially weak and susceptible, but because they were more genetically alike, one to another, than the mongrel Europeans.

  So suppose, he thought to himself as he lay down, this one family were just different enough to live through the plague? Some kind of favorable mutation. They might have decided they were gods. But then, with no one else with which to breed, they’d have fallen into the same trap of genetic homogeneity…ah, the ironies of history…shallow gene pool, just like the cheetahs…

  He thought over the absurd parade of requests he’d received from the mortals. The contrast between their royal expectations, and what was most likely to happen, was painful to contemplate.

  If Dr. Zeus followed usual policy, every byte of data Lewis was absorbing would be wrung from him, and from Mendoza, too, as though they were a pair of sponges; then a team of anthropologists would be sent in, masquerading as Maketaurie and his entourage, no doubt.

  These last survivors, with their culture, would be studied, collected, and packed off to some Company facility like so many rare butterflies. How would they adjust to life as mere Company dependents?

  Too sad to dwell upon…

  Lewis turned and watched Mendoza, intending to offer her helpful advice should she be finding it difficult to go into fugue. To his amazement, she appeared to have succeeded on the first try. Stiffly upright there in the darkness, she had taken on the immobility of a dead branch or a pillar of stone; she seemed nearly transparent, a shade among shadows. Her features were drawn, almost deathly, and yet there was something ecstatic in her expression.

  It frightened him, for no good reason he could name. Lewis felt an irrational urge to leap up, to put his arms around her and carry her away from that inhuman void into which she slipped with such terrifying ease.

  Perhaps she’s meeting him there, thought Lewis. Perhaps the void is Nicholas Harpole.

  Guilt, and regret, and weariness so overcame him that he turned his face away. He tried to remember a place he’d been happy once, a wine shop in Piraeus with a view of the sea, and he’d sat there with a fresh copy of Menander’s Dis Exapaton all one sunny afternoon, with never a care in the world …

  Dawn came with a thousand birds crying, and Lew
is opened his eyes to an empty room. He started up, panicked; but after a moment of scanning he picked up Mendoza’s signal down on one of the terraces. She was pulling weeds again.

  Are you all right? he transmitted.

  Yes! Lewis, it worked. What a great way to rest! I can’t think why we don’t fugue out more often.

  I believe it’s frowned on if you’re posted in an urban environment around mortals, said Lewis. The argument is, you might as well slap a big sign saying CYBORG across your forehead.

  Mendoza responded with a cheerful obscenity. Lewis sighed, got to his feet, and wandered out into the palace courtyard.

  Orocobix sat there, gazing out at the morning. On a block of stone at his feet, the flamecube flickered away; someone had scrupulously cleaned it and figured out how to switch it on. It diffused a pleasant heat against the early morning chill. Little Tanama was just offering her grandfather a cup of something steaming. He accepted it, smiling, and bowed a greeting to Lewis.

  “Good morning, child. I must say, the palace roof has never been so well repaired.”

  “Thank you,” said Lewis, accepting a cup from Tanama. He sipped it: a bitter herbal tea. He had no idea what its botanic origin was; he detected caffeine, as well as chemical compounds intended to regulate metabolism and keep the prostate an acceptable size. Useful, for an elderly mortal male.

  “Are you going to be working on the other side of the house today?” Tanama asked him. “I need to know so—” Orocobix held up his hand in a warning gesture, and she blushed and fell silent. Gathering up the tray with its pot and cups, she hurried indoors.

  “Great Orocobix,” said Lewis, setting aside his cup. “I must be frank with you. It is likely that my master will prefer to take you, and your family, to his own kingdom, rather than leave you here.”

  “I am aware of that, child,” said Orocobix placidly. “The Lord of Coaybay takes all into his realm. It is his nature.”

  “Yes, but your family seems to believe that life will go on, unchanged,” said Lewis. “That will not be the case at all.”

  Orocobix nodded.

  “They are greedy and impatient,” he said. “And not, I think, very great observers of the world. A great tree shoots up from the earth, it bears fruit, the fruit ripens and rots and falls; the tree sees many seasons come and go, watches many harvests drop from its branches. Yet in some hour the tree itself will die at the heart, and rot and fall, too.

  “We were the tree, you see; our people came and went, and finally went away forever, but we Guanikina remained on awhile. And my children have proceeded on the assumption that we would always remain. But I knew our heart had rotted out.

  “When I saw this light, shining out after the sunset, I thought perhaps that Maketaurie was advancing his borders. That was why I went in search of him. What would you have done, child, in my place? Wait to grow weaker, and fewer, as the years go by, dwindling to nothing at last? Or go to him voluntarily while we still had some shred of our former dignity? I have made the best bargain I can. It is, I think, better than we might have expected.”

  Lewis bowed his head. “You are a wise god, Great Orocobix.”

  “And, in any case, it’s not as though we haven’t done this before,” added Orocobix.

  “What?”

  “When we came from the land beyond the sunrise,” said Orocobix.

  “What’s the land beyond the sunrise?” Lewis asked, feeling all his senses come alert. Somewhere, some time, a Company official in a dark room would be listening very closely to this.

  “The place we lived before we sailed in the void,” said Orocobix. “Many, many lives ago. Guanike. I don’t recall it personally anymore, you understand; one head can only hold so many memories.”

  “That’s so true,” said Lewis, with a surreal sense of mirth. Unless you get called in for an upgrade. He edged closer. “What can you tell me, great Orocobix, of what you know? Is it a real place?”

  “It was,” said Orocobix. “Sadly, it sank into the void, and we were obliged to leave. We traveled westward, and found a little country, with mortals to be our servants there. In time we left that land, too—I don’t know why, anymore—and found this place, which was much more suitable because it was simply immense, you know. And now, we travel on again. I think it’s all for the best.”

  Mendoza! Mendoza, you won’t believe what I just heard!

  What? From her tone she was doing something boring in a methodical manner.

  These people have an Atlantis story! They came from some place in the east that sank into the sea!

  Lewis, that’s dumb. Atlantis never really existed. The Company would know if it had.

  What if it was Thera? What if it was in the Black Sea or the Mediterranean?

  Lewis, they are Indians. Run a DNA sample, for heaven’s sake.

  Lewis cleared his throat. “Tell me, great Orocobix: did you bring anything with you from lost Guanike?”

  “Nothing very much,” said Orocobix. “Not a lot of room in an open boat, after all. There’s a little box in my chambers. A few old ornaments.”

  “I would very much like to look upon them, Great Orocobix.”

  “One of these days,” Orocobix replied, with a yawn. “I’ll ask the child to find them for me.”

  Lewis bowed. He scanned the old man; but was able to determine only that he was in good health for his age. And…had evidently once, long since, suffered hepatic insult consistent with parasitic infestation, and recovered completely.

  Lewis staggered up the ladder with a bundle of reeds in his arms and a positive frieze of ancient Atlantean figures processing through his head. Lost Guanike! Where could it have been? Having reached the top of the wall, he peered down into the chamber within, where the ancient plaster crumbled from the walls. Any traces of a painted mural there? Any suspiciously amphoralike jars?

  No.

  But, not far distant, mortal voices raised…Lewis tilted his head, listening. “I can’t move him again! That’s twice in one week, and he gets so tired!” It was Tanama, sounding angry, even tearful.

  “Then I’ll help you move him.” That was Agueybana, sounding peremptory. “We can’t leave him in here; do you want the dead man looking in at him as he mends the damned roof? If we lose our secret, we’ll bargain from a weaker position.”

  “But…if Cajaya marries his master, won’t he find out anyway?”

  “Not likely,” said Agueybana. “He’s a servant, after all! Do you suppose Maketaurie involves such creatures in his private affairs?”

  Lewis, I’m going back to the camp. Mendoza’s transmission so took Lewis by surprise that he nearly fell backward off the ladder.

  What?

  I’ve taken the old man’s boat. I won’t be gone long; but I’ve got to have a credenza to analyze this stuff.

  What stuff?

  The terra preta!

  Oh. Right. Perhaps we could do a quick DNA analysis as well?

  So you can find out whether your Indians are actually from Santorini? Mendoza sounded as though she were grinning. Oh, why not?

  But what am I going to tell them if they notice the boat’s gone?

  Oh, I asked the old man. Startled the daylights out of him when I spoke, but he was polite as anything. See you soon…

  From the ladder he spotted her returning, later in the day, poling along with a credenza strapped to her back; she put in at the landing and started up the steps with a purposeful stride.

  Lewis went wearily through the purple twilight, as a fine drizzle fell. New World One had begun to gleam in his thoughts with a luster it hadn’t possessed in ages; how could he ever have been bored with flush toilets, hot showers or crisp white bed linen?

  Mendoza was already in their room when he walked in, sitting on the edge of his bed with the credenza on her knees, staring into its screen.

  “Hello,” she said in an absentminded way. “I got us a few things while I was over there.”

  “Zeusola bars!” Lewis cried
in delight, and seized up one and tore off its wrapper. “Oh, gods…Caramel Oat Nut, mmm mmm…”

  “A change of clothing, too,” Mendoza added. Lewis looked around for his bag and didn’t see it. She waved a hand at the bundle on the head of the bed.

  “You brought me underwear?” he said, disconcerted. “…Thank you.”

  “You’re a very neat packer,” she said. “It was easy to find. Say, did you happen to ask anybody about the compost formula?

  “Oh! No. I’m sorry. But I did learn something—”

  At that moment they felt the little girl’s approach.

  Oh joy, Mendoza transmitted grumpily. More guavas. She slid the credenza out of sight.

  “Good evening, dead people,” said Tanama. “Look! I brought you some lovely fruit! You’re lucky, we had a really good year for guavas. Grandfather says fruit’s always in season in the Land of the Dead. Is that true?”

  “Why, yes, it is,” said Mendoza, startling Lewis. “We get good watercress, especially. Though of course we don’t grow things the way you do, here, on these hills. Very nice compost you use. How is it made?”

  “Oh, it’s just—” The little girl clapped her hand over her mouth. “It’s—just some stuff. That’s, um, lying around.”

  “I notice it’s a much darker color than the earth of the plain,” said Mendoza, with an interrogative stare like a hot poker.

  This is not the way to ask, Lewis transmitted. Mendoza gave him an impatient look, but subsided as he said: “In the Land Beyond the Sunset, you see, we have no such earth. It’s, er, pink.”

  “Pink?” Tanama looked enchanted. “Like Cajaya’s dress? Really?”

  “Yes, and all the trees grow on flat ground,” said Lewis. “In straight lines.”

  “How strange! That must make them hard to water, when the rains stop,” said Tanama.

  “Oh, our master is clever. He has spirits that fly about with jugs of water tending to them,” said Lewis. “They’re called, er, amphorae. Have you ever heard of such things?”