It might not be a full meeting of the Committee gathered under Ahren's roof that night, but the men whose voices murmured behind closed doors were those who would dominate any such meeting. I had expected to have to answer for the presence of the hopper and was prepared to stand up for Lugard's rights, only to discover that had I presumed to take a flitter, it would not have been noted then.
Annet, busy at dishing up before summoning the men now entrenched in her father's study, informed me of the reason for such an unusual convocation. The ship that had brought in Lugard and the other veterans had, in addition, a second mission. The captain had been contacted, as he came out of hyper into orbit, by a ship now above Beltane, of whose presence we had not been aware. And a plea had been delivered to the Committee.
It was as Lugard had predicted, though his view of the matter had been gloomy. There were ships now without home ports, their native worlds burned-out cinders or radioactive to the point that life could not exist on their deadly surfaces. One such load of refugees now wove a pattern in our sky and asked for landing rights and settlement space.
Beltane had, by the very reason for its settlement, been a "closed" world, its single port open only to certified ships. But that enclosure vanished with the end of the war. The truth was that the sector settlements occupied so little of the continental masses that we were not even a true pioneer world, in spite of the permanence of the hamlets that radiated from the port. The whole eastern land mass was empty of any colonization at all.
Did the old restrictions still prevail? And if they did not—was the welcome signal out for any flotsam of the war? I thought of Lugard's dire prophecy that wolves ranged or would range the star lanes—that those without defenses could be looted, or even taken over. And would these men now conferring with Ahren think of that possibility? I believed not.
I picked up a platter of dunk bread and took it to the long table. Servo-robos were long gone now, save for a few in the labs. We had returned to the early state of our species and used our two hands, our feet, and the strength of our backs to work. Annet was a good cook—I relished what came out of her pots and pans more than the food at the port, which was still running by robo. The appetizing odor of the dunk bread made me realize it had been a long time since noon and that my port meal had been even less satisfactory than usual.
When I returned for a tray of dunk bowls, she was looking out of the window.
"Where did you get the hopper?"
"Portside. I had a passenger into the outback."
She looked at me in surprise. "Outback! But who—?"
"Griss Lugard. He wanted to go to Butte Hold. Came in on the tramp."
"Griss Lugard—who is he?"
"He served with my father. Used to command at Butte Hold before the war."
"Before the war" was even more remote to her than to me. She had hardly been out of a sector crèche when the first news of the conflict had come to us. And I doubted if she could remember the time before.
"What did he come for? He is—was—a soldier, wasn't he?"
Soldiers, men who made fighting their profession, were as legendary on Beltane now as any of the fantastical creatures on the story tapes of the young.
"He was born here. He was given the hold—"
"You mean there are going to be soldiers here again? But the war is over. Father—the Committee—they will protest that! You know the First Law—"
I knew the First Law—how could I escape it? It had been dinned into my ears, and supposedly my head, long enough. "War is waste; there is no conflict that cannot be resolved by men of patience, intelligence, and good will meeting openly in communication."
"No, he's alone. He is no longer with the forces. He's been badly wounded."
"He must be wit-addled too"—she began ladling the stew into the waiting tureen—"if he plans to live out in that wasteland."
"Who's going to live in the wasteland?" Gytha bobbed up, a collection of bowl spoons in her suntanned hands.
"A man named Griss Lugard."
"Griss Lugard—oh, Second-Commandant Lugard." She surprised me as she was so often able to do to all of us. Her mouth curved in a smile at our astonishment, and her two side braids of hair swung as she nodded vigorously. "I can read, can't I? Don't I? Well, I ready more than story tapes. I read history—Beltane history. It's all in the old news tapes. And there's more, too. All about how Second-Commandant Griss Lugard brought artifacts from the lava caves—that he found Forerunner things there. They were going to send someone here from Prime Center to see—then the war came. And nobody ever came. I read a lot of tapes to find out if they did. I bet he's come back to look for treasure—Forerunner treasure! Vere, couldn't we go out and help him look?"
"Forerunner artifacts?" If Gytha said she had read it in the news tapes, it had been there. In such matters she made no mistakes. But I had never heard of any Forerunner remains on Beltane.
When our kind had first broken out of the solar system that had nourished our species, we soon learned that we were not unique in our discovery of the worlds of far space. We met others already free of the lanes between system and system. And, as the galaxy counted time, they, too, were newcomers, though they were centuries in advance of our own first timid star steps. Yet there were those who had gone before them, and others before and before—until one could not count the empires that had risen and fallen or know how many generations of creatures, many much longer lived than we, had passed since some of those Forerunner ships had planeted on long-forgotten worlds.
There had once been a brisk market in Forerunner finds, especially in the core planets of the inner systems where VIP's had wealth and wanted curiosities to spend it on. Museums bought, too, though the story was that a better deal could be made with a private collector. If the tape Gytha quoted had the truth, then I could understand Lugard's return to the Butte. Having been granted it, he would have legal title to any find thereabouts. But that such a luxury trade would be of use to him now—No, if conditions were as bad as his pessimistic account made them, one could tumble into a whole Forerunner warehouse and get no good of it.
However, there is always a pull to the thought of treasure, and I cannot deny that Gytha's reaction was mine—to go look for such. The thought made one's blood run a little faster.
The lava caves were no place for the prudent to venture unless a man knew something of the territory and went well equipped for all emergencies. They are not formed like usual caves by the action of water, but rather are born of fire. A tongue of lava flows down a slope and congeals on the outer surface, but the interior remains molten and continues to move, forming a passage. After ages, the roof of such a tube may collapse, opening it to the outer world. These long corridor caves can run for miles. The landscape around them is ridged with trenches where some cave ceilings have entirely collapsed, and in places natural bridges of rock span them. There are craters, broken volcanic cones, hazards that close the country to the casual traveler.
"Could we, Vere? Perhaps the Rovers could go?" Gytha clattered her spoons against each other in rising excitement.
"Certainly not!" Annet whirled around from the cook unit, a ladle dripping in her hand. "That is dangerous country; you know that, Gytha!"
"Not alone," Gytha returned, none of her excitement in the least dampened. "Vere would go and you maybe. We'd abide by the rules, no straying. And I never saw a lava cave—"
"Annet," Ahren called from the other room, "we're in a hurry, daughter."
"Yes, coming—" She went back to filling the tureen. "Take the spoons in, Gytha. And, if you please, Vere, the preserve crocks."
Her mother had not come in. This was not unusual, since experiments in the lab did not wait on meal hours, and Annet was long resigned to sending over a tray or keeping back a portion of a dish. Consequently, she most always gave us food that could be reheated or set out successfully for a second or even a third time.
The visitors and their host were already seated at the head of the table, and we took the hint to sit at the foot, not to interrupt. Not being truly one of their number, I usually found the conversation at such gatherings of little interest. But tonight might be different.
However, if I had hoped to hear more of the refugee ship, I was disappointed. Corson ate mechanically, as one whose mind was entirely elsewhere. Ahren was as taciturn. Only Alik Alsay paid Annet compliments concerning the food and finally turned to me.
"Good report you turned in, Collis, about the north slope."
Had he been Corson, I would have been pleased, even flattered a little. But I knew very well that my report was of small interest to Alsay, that he was merely making conversation. I murmured thanks, and that would have been that had not Gytha taken a hand for motives of her own. When she chose to fasten onto some project, as I might well have remembered, she generally, sooner or later, got her way.
"Vere was out to the lava beds today. Have you been there, First-Tech Alsay?"
"Lava beds." He paused in raising his cup of caff in open surprise. "But why? There is no authorized mapping in that direction—simply wasteland. What took you there, Collis?"
"I took someone—Sector-Captain Lugard. He is at Butte Hold."
"Lugard?" Ahren came out of his preoccupation. "Griss Lugard? What is he doing on Beltane?"
"I don't know. He says he was given Butte Hold—"
"Another garrison!" Ahren set down his cup with a clatter that slopped a little of the caff over on his fingers. "We will not have that nonsense here again! The war is over. There is no need for any Security force!" The way he said "security" made it sound like an oath. "There is certainly no danger here, and we will not have any of those controls foisted on us again. The sooner they learn that, the better." He glanced from Alsay to Corson. "This puts another light on the whole matter."
But what matter he did not explain. Instead, he demanded of me a full accounting of what I had learned from Lugard, and when I had given that, Alsay cut in.
"It would seem Lugard has the hold as a pension."
"Which could be only a cover-up he used with the boy." Ahren was still aroused. "But his port papers—they ought to tell us something. And"—once more he turned his attention to me—"you might well keep an eye on him, Vere. Since he accepted your help in getting there, he could well understand your dropping in again—"
What he was suggesting I did not like, but I would not say that yet, not before these others and across the table where I ate by his leave, under the roof he had made mine. Something in Lugard's return seemed to have flicked Ahren on the raw; otherwise, he would not have gone to the length of hinting I should spy on a man who had been my father's good friend.
"Father"—once more Gytha cut in, still intent on her own wishes—"can't Vere take us with him. The Rovers have never been to the lava lands."
I expected Ahren to quell her with one of those single glances he used with effect. But he did not, and when he made no quick answer, Alsay spoke.
"Ah, the Rovers. And what has been their latest adventure, my dear?" He was one of those adults who were never at ease with children, and his voice took on a stilted note, used earlier to a lesser extent with me.
Gytha could be polite when the occasion, by her measurement, warranted it. She smiled at the Yetholme leader, and she could smile winningly when she chose.
"We went to the gullat lizard hatchery and made a recording of peep cries," she replied. "It was for Dr. Drax's communication experiment."
I applauded her cunning. To remind her father at this point of some volunteered aid in the past was a bolster for her present demand to widen horizons.
"Yes," Ahren agreed. "It really was an outstanding piece of work, Alsay, showing great patience and perseverance. So now you would like to see the lava beds—"
I was startled. Could he actually agree? Across the table I saw Annet stiffen; her lips moved as if they were already shaping a protest. But Alsay spoke again and this time to me.
"Quite a useful organization, Collis. You are supplementing the teaching tapes very well. It is a pity we have not been able to advance to off-world study. But now that the war is over, there will be opportunities for that."
Did he really believe so, I wondered. The Rovers were more Gytha's idea than mine, though she had drawn me into it and locked me to her purposes so well that I could not now have dropped the project even if I wanted to.
When the settlers had come to Beltane, they had intended to train their children into a science-minded caste. In fact, experiments in such education had been part of the original plan. However, the war had interfered with this as with so much else. Off-world science during those years might have made some great strides. We suspected as much. But our knowledge had become so specialized and narrowed that, lacking fresh imports of taped information, we generally still went over ground ten years old by planet dating, perhaps a hundred by advances elsewhere.
To counteract this stultifying effect had been one of the tasks of the educators. However, the cream of them had been drafted for service. Those remaining—like the sector people—tended to be conservative, the older ones. Then there was a drastic epidemic in the third year of the war (caused said rumor—we always had rumor—by over-zealous experimentation for the Services that resulted in a battle between the sector chiefs and the commandant and the closing down of two projects). After that there were even fewer left to be concerned with the training of the next generation. By spasms parents came out of their labs and studies long enough to be excited for a moment over the lack of concentrated cramming for their children. Then some sudden twist in their own work, some need for complete concentration, took their minds off the matter.
There were never many children—at Kynvet now only eight, ranging from the seven-year-old twins Dagny and Dinan Norkot to Thad Maky, who was fourteen and considered himself—irritatingly at times—nearly adult.
Gytha early dominated. She had a vivid imagination and a total recall memory. Her use of every tape she could lay hand on, though she was barred from digging into lab recordings, had given her a wide range of the most miscellaneous and amazing information. But she differentiated clearly between fact and fiction, and she could spin a fantasy or answer a factual question in the space of a couple of breaths. To the younger children, she was a fountain of wisdom. They appealed to her general knowledge before they approached any adult, for the abstraction of their parents had become so much of a habit by now that this community was really split into two, marked by the difference in ages.
Having organized her followers, Gytha had worked upon me. And I found, whether I willed it or no, I was leading expeditions of the Rovers sometimes more than I was trying to further my own Ranger studies. At first I had rebelled at assuming such responsibilities, but Gytha's discipline held so well, her threat to any one of them of being left out was direful, that they did obey orders. And it came to be a source of pride to me that I was in part a teacher for those eager to learn.
Annet was not quite one of us. She always distrusted Gytha's enthusiasms and thought her sister very prone to reckless disregard for danger. But she did not give vocal vent to any worries when I was in command, for she knew I would not willingly lead them into trouble. Now and then she did join one of our expeditions, her role usually being that of managing the commissary. And, I will say this in her favor—she never made any complaint when on the march.
But to take the Rovers into the lava lands—no, that was where I joined with Annet and was ready to hold firmly to the negative. But Ahren leaned forward a little to question his younger daughter.
"Do you have a project in mind?" He at least knew how to talk to the younger generation, using the same tone of interest with which he would have greeted a remark from one of his colleagues.
"Not yet." Gytha was always honest. She never tried to conceal facts. "Only, we've been to the swamps, and up in the hills several times, and never there. It is to broaden horizons—" She fell back on her own general term for exploration. "We would like to see Butte Hold."
I noted that she said nothing of a hunt for Forerunner treasure.
"Broaden horizons, eh? What about it, Vere? You were in there today with a hopper. How was the terrain?"
I could not hedge, though I wanted to. He need only check the reading on the machine dial to know the truth, though I did not know why Imbert Ahren would do such a thing. Only, I did know him well enough to recognize a state of mind-made-up. He wanted us to go to the lava lands—or at least to Butte Hold. And the reason for that took little guessing—he wanted a report on Lugard. Perhaps he thought if he could not get it readily from me, he could from Gytha. Children's eyes are sharp, and they see much.
"Well enough around the Butte. I would not venture farther without a good survey."
"Gytha"—Ahren turned to her—"would a trip to Butte Hold enlarge horizons enough for the present?"
"Yes! When—tomorrow?" She demanded almost in one breath.
"Tomorrow? Well—yes, tomorrow might be very good. And, Annet"—he spoke to the older girl—"we shall be at the port. Your mother will accompany us. I think that the Norkots and the Wymarks will be going, too, for a general meeting. Why don't you make this a full-day outing? Take food for a—do you not say—cookout?"
Again I was sure she would protest. But in face of the firmness underlying that suggestion, she did not. Gytha gave an exclamation of delight. I thought she was already mentally listing supplies needed to uncover Forerunner treasure.
"Give my greetings to the Sector-Captain," Ahren said to me. "Say that we shall be very glad to see him at the port. We may be able to profit by his experience."
That I doubted. Ahren's opinion of the military had been stated so many times, forcibly for the most part, that I could not conceive of his listening to Griss Lugard on any subject without impatience and a closed mind.
Ahren was so eager to speed us on our way that he gave me permission to use the supply hopper, which I knew to be in repair and which would hold our whole company. Once supper was done, Gytha was off at light speed to warn her crew of the next day's promise.
I helped Annet clear the table and saw her frown as she fed the dishes into the one kitchen mecho that still ran—the infra cleaner.
"Father wants to know about Griss Lugard," she said abruptly. "He doesn't trust him."
"He need only go out and meet the man, and he'd know the truth." I was unhappy about the way we were being used. "Lugard is certainly not planning to take over Beltane! He probably only wants to be left alone—and I don't think he will welcome us too much."
"Because he does have something to hide?" she flashed.
"Because he must want peace and quiet."
"A soldier?"
"Even they can grow tired of war." I had skirted her prejudices before. They were rooted in what she had been taught all her life. My situation as more guest than family had made me talk and walk with circumspection ever since I had been sorrowfully and firmly put through a discussion session for defending my absent father's beliefs with my fists when I was all of ten.
"Perhaps." But she was not convinced. "Do you really think there is something in the Forerunner artifact story? That seems unlikely. There were never any traces of anything found on the surface."
"Not that we have searched very thoroughly," I countered, not because I did believe in any treasure, but to keep the record correct. It was true that we had aerial surveys of much of the western continent, plus the reports of all the early exploring parties, but although those made a network of the known across much of the land, it was a loose one, with perhaps something to be learned about what lay in the gaps between.
The land was wide and empty. Perhaps those of the refugee ship, were they permitted to settle, could even find a good place to the north, south, or farther west, without changing much the course of our pattern.
We prepared for an early takeoff in the morning, but we were still behind those who left for the port. I gathered that they were assembling not only the full Committee, but also as many of the others as they could to hear the petition of the orbiting ship. But for the children, this subject took second place. The lava country had been so talked up by Gytha that I feared there might be some disappointment later.
So I sat in the pilot's seat, half facing around as we readied to go, and made it most plain to my passengers that our destination was Butte Hold and not the rough country behind it, which we had no intention of entering. Also, they were not to fasten on Lugard or enter the hold unless at his invitation, which secretly I thought would not be uttered. Were he wise and caught sight of us on any view screen when we landed, he would leave us to wander outside his wall.
Privately, I had also made it clear to Gytha that if Lugard did appear and be hospitable, she was not to mention Forerunners, treasure, or anything of the sort.
I was answered by her scorn. As if she did not know how to act! I was, she commented, getting to be as narrow-minded as Annet. And if that was what came of growing up, she would try to get some sort of retarding pills from one of the labs and be herself for years yet. She liked to be the way she was, and she didn't try to make people over either!
The flight-hop from Kynvet was shorter than that from the port. In the old days, Kynvet had been the first link in the chain tying the Butte to the other settlements. In less than an hour, we touched down on the blowing sand of the old landing. I fully expected to see the Butte firmly closed, but its door stood open to the morning sun and there was Lugard, entirely as if he had invited and expected us.
Obeying orders, the Rovers hung back as I went to explain our presence, but I heard some muffled exclamations. The veteran was not alone. On one of his thin shoulders perched a herwin, as if it had known him since its hatching. And by his boots crouched a rock hanay, while between his fingers he held a slender dark red rod. He did not speak or hail us, but rather he raised the rod to his lips. Then he began to pipe—and at that trickle of clear notes falling in a trill as might spring rain, the herwin whistled its morning call and the hanay rocked back and forth on its clawed digging paws, as if the music sent it into a clumsy dance.
I do not know how long we stood there, listening to music that was like none I had ever heard before, but which drew us. Then Lugard set aside the pipe, and he was smiling.
"Magic," he said softly, "Drufin magic." He gave one last note, and the herwin took wing, sailing straightway up into the sky, while the hanay seemed to see us for the first time, gave a startled grunt, and waddled into hiding among the rocks.
"Welcome." Lugard still smiled. "I am Griss and you are—?"
The children, as if released from a spell, ran to him, and each called his name as if he wished to claim instant recognition from this worker of magic. He gave them greeting and then suggested that they explore the Butte, making them welcome to any room with an open door. When they had gone into the corridor behind him, he looked at me, at Annet, and back to me, and his face was darkly sober.
"The refugee ship"—his question was a command for an answer—"what have they decided to do concerning that?"
"We don't know. They have a meeting at the port today."
He limped on into the sun. "Lend me your hopper." Again it as more order than asking. "They can't be so stupid as to let them land—"
I stood aside without a question, so compelling was the force of his preoccupation. It was clear he harbored some thought to the extinction of all else.
He was in the cabin, raised from the ground, when Annet cried out, "Vere! He's going off with all our food—leaving us here! When will he be back? Stop him!"
Since this was now a complete impossibility, I caught her arm and pulled her out of the miniature dust storm raised in his takeoff, urging her to the Butte. She turned on me then with demands to know why I had let him go. And to tell the truth, I had no real answer for her. But I did manage to make her understand that Lugard's supplies could certainly be used by us under the circumstances, and it might be well to see what the Rovers were doing inside.