Poul Anderson

“ Leda was beside him, her clear war-cry raising as she stabbed and struck; Shan the Engineer was chopping and roaring pious mottoes on his other flank: the Temple men pushed against the roiling soldiers, took their blows on their heavier armor, and gave them back with murder behind. The clamor of men and metal was a roar as of sundering worlds.
Rayth was fighting like a demon, his blade whirling and shrieking, his voice lifted in a rallying-cry that drew his scattered followers together. He had courage, thought Rikard above the snarl of combat—perhaps he was a fitter chief after all. ”

“ Amaris rode high in a froth of stars, painting the hills with a dim eerie silver in which monstrous shadows lurked. The wind blew stronger, colder, with a faint smell of salt like the ghost of the long-dried ocean. Alfric wrapped his worn cloak tighter about him against its searching chill. Save for the vast echoing howl of the wind, the hiss of sand and rustle of leaves, he was alone in the dark. He heard the creak and jingle of his harness, the rapid clopclop of the hengist's hoofs, against a background of hooting night. ”

“ So did we shout at Noreia, when Rome first learned who we are; so did we cry on the Alps, when we romped naked in the snow and slid down glaciers on our shields; so did we howl as we ripped up a forest to dam the Adige, break the Roman bridge and wring the eagle's neck! Hee-hoo!
It was a blink of time, and it was forever, before he saw the enemy cavalry before him. A shape sprang out of whirling gray dust, a shadow, a face. Eodan saw that the man's chin was scarred. He reached into his belt, whipped out one of his darts, and hurled it. He saw it glance off the Roman cuirass. ”

“ The reality was here, just beyond the walls, where Neptune hung ashen above glittering snow that was not snow, where a thin poisonous wind whimpered between barren snags, where the dark and the cold flowed triumphantly close. The reality would be a block of solid gas, a hundred human corpses locked in it like flies in amber, it would be death and the end of all things.
He spoke slowly, through numbed lips: "Why has man always supposed that God cared?"
"We don't know if He does or not," said Catherine. "But man cares, isn't that enough?" ”

“ It isn't so much a question of losing immortality, though God knows that means a lot. It means more than any mortal will ever know. It's that I'd be losing—Tanith.
He thought of Sol, Sirius, Antares, the great suns and planets of the Galaxy, and could not keep from shuddering. Drabness, deadness, colorlessness, meaninglessness! Life was a brief blind spasm of accident and catastrophe, walled in by its own shortness and the barren environment of a death-doomed cosmos. Too small to achieve any purpose, too limited even to imagine a goal, it flickered and went out into an utter dark. ”

“ The wind came from the north with sleet on its back. Raw shuddering gusts whipped the sea till the ship lurched and men felt driven spindrift stinging their faces. Beyond the rail there was winter night, a moving blackness where the waves rushed and clamored; straining into the great dark, men sensed only the bitter salt of sea-scud, the nettle of sleet and the lash of wind.
Cappen lost his footing as the ship heaved beneath him, his hands were yanked from the icy rail and he went stumbling to the deck. The bilge water was new coldness on his drenched clothes. ”

“ The sea danced and glittered beyond the rustling trees, crying its old song to the fair green land, and the wind that blew from it was keen and cold and pungent with life. The fields were stirring in the wind, a long ripple of grass, and high overhead a bird was singing.
"It's—very beautiful," I said.
"Yes." I could hardly hear her voice. "Yes, it is. Let's go, Erling."
We got into the carplane and slanted skyward. The boys crowded forward with me, staring ahead for the first glimpse of the landing field, not seeing the forests and meadows and shining rivers that slipped away beneath us. ”

“ Somewhere the soft trill of a sandrunner echoed between low wind-worn cliffs, and the brush began to speak, whispering back and forth in its ancient wordless tongue.
The desert, the planet and its wind and sand under the high cold stars, the clean open land of silence and loneliness and a destiny which was not man's, spoke to him. The enormous oneness of life on Mars, drawn together against the cruel environment, stirred in his blood. As the sun went down and the stars blossomed forth in awesome frosty glory, Kreega began to think again. ”

“ The surge of white, hating faces reached beyond vision, mouths agape, eyes red and running, animal voices barking and clamoring. Rikard had never seen a true mob before, and the elemental violence of it shook even his calloused soul. It did not occur to him to regret the fact that many of these people must die.
Rayth stood for an instant stroking his beard, thinking, and then he lifted his sword and sprang over the rail. The lines followed him, jumping one by one, a dozen men simultaneously floating down with pikes reaching beneath them. ”

“ He thought of flying with Zarek, his team-mate, from the rendezvous to this area assigned as theirs. Plains like oceans of grass, wind-rippled, darkened with the herds of wild cattle whose hoofbeats were a thunder in the earth; forests, hundreds of kilometers of old and mighty trees, rivers piercing them in a long steel gleam; lakes where fish leaped; spilling sunshine like warm rain, radiance so bright it hurt his eyes, cloud-shadows swift across the land. It had all been empty of man, but still there was a vitality here which was almost frightening to Jorun. ”

“ At day's end they passed a goatherd in a stinking wool tunic and knitted Phrygian cap. He gave them a sullen look and mumbled his own language, which they did not understand, through greasy whiskers. Eodan felt grimness. Bad enough to be entering wilds where few if any could speak with him; but this was also a land where the half-Persian warriors had made themselves hated. He thought, as darkly and coldly as the whistling twilight, that Flavius might well overhaul him tomorrow before he had any word of Phryne. He might be wholly doomed; the gods feared proud men. ”

“ The horizonless world within himself was a glorious thing to explore. And that had oriented him outward to the real world—he had felt wind and rain and sunlight, the pride of high buildings and the surge of a galloping horse, thresh of waves and laughter of women and smooth mysterious purr of great machines, with a fullness that made him pity those deaf and dumb and blind around him. ”

“ Why are you working in a place like this, when you could be the greatest courtesan in the world? Kings would be your slaves, and armies would go to battle with your name on their lips—if they only knew you."
She shrugged. "Fortune does strange things sometimes," she said. "I am Freha, and I am here because I must be." Her slim fingers ruffled his harsh black hair. "But tonight," she breathed, "I am glad of it, since you came. And who are you, stranger?"
"I am Alfric, called the Wanderer, son of Beodan the Bold, son of Asgar the Tall, from the hills and lakes of Aslak." ”

“ More than immortality, more than all the mighty dreams you give us, there is yourself. A day on Tanith is more than a lifetime on Terra, but they will never know that because they have never felt it. The strong love of a man for his home—but this is passion, it is the whole of life, and Tanith gives it back. Here, and here alone, is meaning and beauty and an unending splendid horizon. Here alone a man can belong. ”

“ In twenty years of spacing, you can see a lot of worlds, and you can have a lot of experience. We had been gods of a sort, flitting from star to star, exploring, trading, learning, now and again mixing into the destinies of the natives. We had fought and striven, suffered and laughed and stood silent in wonder. For most of us, the dreadful hunger for home, the weariness of the hopeless quest, had shadowed that panorama of worlds which reeled through my mind. But—before Cosmos, I had loved every minute of it! ”

“ It was a strong and well-trained force, filling the corridor with hard bodies and edged steel, pikes and axes aloft, raising a shout that roared and boomed down the hall as Rayth appeared. He put himself in the van, with the barbarians in the second rank behind his, and the troop started off to battle.
Clang of booted feet slammed echoing on the metal floor, rattle and clash of armor, grim jests tossed from lip to bearded lip. These were the killers, the professionals without fear of man or Earth, the trained elite which formed an army within an army and the fulcrum of the noble power. ”

“ Faintly through the window and the whining night-wind, they heard the crash of a great gong.
"Dannos is rising," whispered Freha. "Tonight he mates with Mother Amaris. It is said that the Fates walk through the streets of Valkarion on such nights." She shivered. "Indeed they do on this eve."
"Perhaps," said Alfric, though the hackles rose on his neck. "But how do you know?"
"Have you not heard?" Her voice shuddered, seeming to blend with the moan of wind and steady, slow boom of gong. "Have you not heard? The Emperor Aureon is dying. He is not expected to last till dawn. ”

“ The brush rustled and something wailed in darkness and the wind blew with a wild mournful sound over faintly starlit cliffs, and it was as if they all somehow had voice, as if the whole world muttered and threatened him in the night. Dimly, he wondered if man would ever subdue Mars, if the human race had not finally run across something bigger than itself. ”

“ He searched further, up over the Caucasus glaciers and then down to a sea that roared under his lash, until finally he came riding past a bloody-breasted hound, through sounding caves to the gates of hell; hoofs rang hollow as he circled hell, calling Phryne's name, but there was no answer. Though he shook his spear beneath black walls, no one stirred, no one spoke, even the echoes died. So he knew that hell was dead, it had long ago been deserted; and he rode back to the upper world feeling loneliness horrible within him. ”

“ Clouds scudded overhead like flying smoke, and the wind was loud in the trees.
The line of Terrans moving slowly into the vessel seemed to go on forever. A couple of the ship's crew flew above them, throwing out a shield against the rain. They shuffled without much talk or expression, pushing carts filled with their little possessions. Jorun stood to one side, watching them go by, one face after another—scored and darkened by the sun of Earth, the winds of Earth, hands still grimy with the soil of Earth. ”

“ The rebel rolled, barely ducking the thrust, and Rayth grinned without much malice and sprang at him. His sword clattered and yelled, biting the Nyracan's arms, bouncing off the hard-held guard to sing around his opponent's ears. Rikard fell back, grunting in surprise, and Rayth pursued him, lightfooted, leaping, playing with him.
Scream and clangor of steel, hoarse gasps for breath, bounding human forms in a strange and terrible grace of murder, clash and bite and two faces staring into each other's eyes across the web of flying metal. Rikard hewed out again and again, cleaving empty air ”

“ Wearily, Kreega scrambled up on top of the rock and crouched low. He had backtracked to it; they should by rights go past him toward his tower.
He could see it from here, a low yellow ruin worn by the winds of millennia. There had only been time to dart in, snatch a bow and a few arrows and an axe. Pitiful weapons—the arrows could not penetrate the Earthman's suit when there was only a Martian's thin grasp to draw the bow, and even with a steel head the axe was a small and feeble thing. But it was all he had, he and his few little allies of a desert which fought only to keep its solitude. ”

“ Bright Dannos was sweeping triumphantly down on pale Mother Amaris; he would cover her and then pass on, and out of that wedding would come the fate of the world. Cold fate, dark destiny—night and famine and death, the moons hurtling over a world sunk into final oblivion.
Well, men died, sometime or other, and all they could do about it was to meet the end bravely. Alfric squared his shoulders and marched into the Temple. ”

“ The Roman nodded at Hwicca. "We spoke of this now and then, you and I. Do you remember? There was a time you gathered jasmine blossoms—"
"Be still about that or I will forget my word!" roared Eodan in the Cimbric. Hwicca huddled back and lifted an arm, as though to ward off a blow.
"As you wish," said Flavius, unruffled. "To continue—" A crash outside, and the sound of swearing and a whip, interrupted him—"I myself do not believe in any Power except chance. There are blind moieties of matter, obeying blind laws; only the idiot hand of chance keeps each cycle of centuries from being the same. ”

“ Riordan did not look closely at the tower. It was a crumbling stump atop a rusty hill, unhuman and grotesque. Once, perhaps ten thousand years ago, the Martians had had a civilization of sorts, cities and agriculture and a neolithic technology. But according to their own traditions they had achieved a union or symbiosis with the wild life of the planet and had abandoned such mechanical aids as unnecessary. Riordan snorted.
The hound bayed again. The noise seemed to hang eerily in the still, cold air; to shiver from cliff and crag and die reluctantly under the enormous silence. ”

“ From the boundless wastes of the desert shall he ride, ruin and darkness in his train, and the last long night of the Empire will fall when he comes.
"Woe, Dannos, your temple will stand in flames when the heathen king is come! Woe, Mother Amaris, he will defile your holy altars and break them down! Gods themselves must die, their dust will whirl, on the breath of his wind-god, the last blood of the Empire will be swallowed by the thirsty desert. ”

“ Eodan held onto his soul with both hands. At last he got out: "I will meet you somewhere beyond the power of both Rome and Pontus."
Flavius skinned his teeth in a grin. "Your destruction is more important to me than the dubious pleasures of single combat."
"You are afraid, then," said Eodan. "You only fight women."
Flavius clenched his free hand. His whittled face congealed, he said in a flat voice: "I cannot help but smite those women whom you forever make your shields. Now it is a Greek slave girl. How many more have you crawled behind, even before you debauched my wife?" ”

“ Kreega drew the bow as far as he could. But the human had to come near first—
There he came, running and bounding over the rocks, rifle in hand and restless eyes shining with taut green light, closing in for the death. Kreega swung softly around. The beast was beyond the rock now, the Earthman almost below it.
The bow twanged. With a savage thrill, Kreega saw the arrow go through the hound, saw the creature leap in the air and then roll over and over, howling and biting at the thing in its breast.
Like a gray thunderbolt, the Martian launched himself off the rock, down at the human. ”

“ Year by year, the towns crumble, bridges fall, canals dry up, people grow fewer—and nobody cares. A world is blowing away in red dust, and nobody stirs to help. By the winds of Ruho, it's about time someone pulled down that tottering wreck you call Imperial civilization! It's about time we forgot the past and started thinking—and doing—something about the present. The man who burns Valkarion will be doing the world a service!"
Silence, under the wind and the stars and the two moons marching toward their union. Hildaborg hefted her spear until the point gleamed near Alfric's throat. ”

“ On the wharfs Eodan could see Armenian mountaineers with shepherds' staffs and crooked knives, a sleek Byzantine merchant, a gaily-robed warrior of pure Gallic strain, a pair of hobnailed Macedonian mercenaries, a spear-bearing man, in fur cap and white blouse and baggy trousers tucked into his boots, whom Tjorr said delightedly was an Alanic tribesman, a graybearded Jew, a lean Arab—this was not Rome, this Sinope, but it pulled in its share of the earth's people! ”

“ Black against the sky, the Temple loomed on the hillcrest, but Alfric saw no movement.
Hildaborg slipped against him. "Now what shall we do?" she whispered.
He laughed softly, the old grim battle joy flowing up in him. Weariness and despair fell off like an outworn cloak—there was new strength in his thews and a goal in his mind.
"I heard, down there, how Valkarion really hates the priests," he said. "The city is seething with revolt which wants only a leader. Could the common folk rise, I think nigh all the city guards, impressed into priest service by fear, would come over to their side. ”

“ No man, no woman ever has the same destiny; we are all pursued by our private Furies. Help me remember that, Eodan!"
He asked her, out of a newly reborn pain, "What happened, Phryne?"
"There was a boy in the household at Plataea," she said, still in the small voice that spoke to itself, knowing him only as a shadow under the evening star. "He was a slave too—not much older.... He walked like the sun before me. We would have had each other somehow—oh, there are families among slaves, even a slave can build a home. ”

“ Of a sudden Alfric stiffened. He heard the measured tramp of feet—a city patrol approaching, just around the next corner. Whirling, he led the way into an alley black as a cave mouth. It was blind, but there was a door at the end, from behind which came the twanging of harps and the thin evil whine of desert flutes. A tavern—shelter, of a sort—
Moonlight glistened on steel as the half-dozen guardsmen passed the alley—passed, stopped, and turned back. "They may be here," Alfric heard a voice. ”