"And if not?"
"You will be given the powers you ask." Dekel ended the discussion. "And Marie will be the new cyber prime."
Salvation came on the thirteenth day in the shape of a tiny mote blurred with refracted light. Closer and details became plain: hills, plains, fuming volcanoes. A crusted shore edged a leaden ocean. Blotched vegetation slashed by rivers and pocked with clearings. The surface held the brooding stillness of a graveyard.
Ysanne woke, struggling to breathe, clawing at the hand clamped over her nose and mouth as she snatched at the laser holstered at her waist. Fingers of steel trapped her wrist and she heaved in a sudden mindless terror.
"Easy," soothed Dumarest. "Easy."
"Earl!" She gasped as his hand fell from her mouth. "What the hell are you doing?"
"You were crying out," he said. "Screaming."
She was lost in nightmare and the prey of ghosts and horrors rooted in the past. Sitting upright she felt sweat dry on her face beneath the caress of a cool breeze.
"A dream," she said. "I was dreaming."
And making noise, which he had stopped with a grim efficiency in order to block the air and prevent any possible outcry. An assassin's trick-had he maintained the pressure she would have died.
Dumarest said, "Are you all right now?"
"Yes."
"Then get back to sleep."
She was too wide-awake to drift again into dreams. Instead she watched as Dumarest returned to the fire, squatting to feed the embers with scraps of fuel, flames rising to scorch the carcass spitted over the hearth. The dancing light illuminated his face, accentuating the planes and hollows, the hard line of the jaw, the somber pits of his eyes. A barbaric face; it belonged to worlds untouched by civilization. And this was just such a world; small, harsh, circling a violent sun. The sky lavender by day and now a mass of blazing stars. Against them the bulk of the Erce reared in mechanical symmetry. From within the ship came the monotonous beat of pumps.
She inhaled, fringed leather tightening over the prominences of her breasts, savoring the sweetness of the natural air, remembering the last few days of their journey, the mounting desperation, the knowledge that the lives of them all depended on her skill. To find a haven and guide the Erce to it-a harsh test for any navigator in the Chandorah. The more so when cooped up in the prison of a suit, skin chafed raw by fabric and metal, lungs starved, nostrils clogged with the stench of accumulated wastes.
A bad time but they had been able to survive. There was an added zest to the air and she inhaled again, relishing the taste of it, the flavor. Air even now was being forced into the tanks aboard the ship but it would never taste the same once they were back in space.
Rising, she stepped toward the fire on silent feet. A tall woman, the thick braids of her hair matched the ebon of her eyes. The wide belt encircling her waist emphasized the swell of her hips. Her face held the sheen of copper and, in repose, held the broad impassivity of a primitive idol.
"I'm not tired," she said.
Silent as she had been, Dumarest had sensed her coming, looking up from where he tended the fire. "If you want to bed down I'll take over the watch."
He shook his head, turning the carcass on its spit; a rodentlike thing as large as a small dog, which sent droplets of juice to hiss on the coals.
"I suppose I could help the others," she mused. "But there's no hurry. Anyway I want to enjoy the night."
She meant the darkness and his presence in the close intimacy of firelight. Turning, she searched the area beyond the glow seeing nothing but formless shadows; fronds tipped with star-silvered tufts, irregular lines framed against the nighted sky, thin spinelike leaves stirring to the soft breeze in a barely audible susurration. Listening, she heard only that and the beat of the pumps and the soft rustle of falling embers.
"So peaceful," she said. "A paradise. We've been here for days now and seen nothing to threaten us."
"As yet."
"It's a deserted world, Earl," she insisted. "No people. Not even a name. Just a place with a number. We were damned lucky to find it." With a rush she added, "Do we have to move on? This is a good world. We could stay here. Build a house. Farm. Hunt. Found a Tribe. We-" She broke off as he shook his head. "No?"
"No."
"But why not, Earl?" She knew the reason and gave it before he could answer. "Earth!" She spat the word as if it were a curse. Sparks rose as she kicked at the fire, filling the air with twinkling points, falling to rest in grey ash on her boot. "What can you find there you couldn't find here? And we know this world exists."
"As does Earth."
"So you say, but ask anyone and they will tell you it's a legend. A myth. This world is neither. It's here and we're on it and we could make it ours. Ours, Earl! Ours!"
That dream was held by every adventurer who headed into space. To find a virgin planet, to settle, to own and to rule. It could still be done and once it had been common but, always, there were snags. Things Dumarest pointed out even as his eyes searched the shadows, the ragged line of vegetation limned against the stars.
Ysanne was stubborn. "You don't understand, Earl. You don't want to understand. A survey could have checked the area and listed all local worlds. They need never have landed. Or a mining company could have found nothing in the way of valuable minerals. Or-"
"It was listed."
"By number, not by name."
"Which means it was discovered some time ago."
"Yes, but-"
"They could have found acid rains," he interrupted. "Lethal climatic changes. Destructive radiation from solar flares-a hundred things. And we are four people in a crippled ship. Assuming the others were willing, what could we do? Farm? Without machines, seed, local knowledge? Build? Hunt?"
"Live," she said. "Make this place our own. A world to pass on to our children."
Her yearning was born of longing and basic need but her early culture had blinded her to harsh reality. This world was no paradise with food growing on every tree and useful materials on every bush-free of disease and harmful life. To survive at all would take every scrap of effort they could muster and any children would need to become as savage as the environment if they hoped to exist. But it was a yearning he could understand.
"I'm sorry." Ysanne sensed his mood. "I'm being foolish, I guess, but, well, it seemed a good idea. It still seems one." She filled her lungs with the fragrant air. "It's crazy to live in a metal can when you could live in the open like this. To feel the sun and rain and touch of the wind. To be able to walk in a straight line until you can't take another step. To run and jump and go hunting for dinner." She shook her head, the thick braids framing her face making silken rustlings as they caressed the leather of her tunic. "I had it all once-why did I leave it?"
For excitement. For adventure and romance and curiosity. For change and novelty and, most of all, for escape. That was the reason most star-crazed youngsters headed into space, only to find there an environment more restrictive than any they had ever known.
To one side silvered fronds danced in sudden movement against the sky.
"Keep alert," said Dumarest. "I'm going to check the area."
"There's no need," she said quickly. "It was just the wind."
He ignored the comment as he ignored the sudden gust which stirred the flames and she watched as he picked up a rifle from where it had rested close to the fire. The action made small, metallic noises as he checked the action, the weapon itself seeming to become an extension of his body as he moved into the encircling darkness. To him suspicion had become a natural trait, a continual mistrust of things being wholly what they seemed.
A stranger, she thought, and felt a sudden chill. Still a stranger despite the hours they had spent in each other's arms, the passion they had shared. He would go his own way despite all logic and against all odds. Yet know that she could respect him the more because of it. Love him the deeper for his ruthless determination. Such a man would father strong children-when they found Earth she would make him her own.
Chapter Two
Nothing had changed. The office was as Elge had known it and before him Nequal and before him others who had become cyber primes to rule and then to yield their power when their time had come. As he would yield in turn--but never in the entire history of the Cyclan had a cyber rejected the possibility of attaining the highest office.
Marie pondered that fact as he inspected his new domain. He had seen it before but now there was a subtle difference which held its own relish. Now, in this place, he was the master. He would make the decisions and guide the progress of the master plan. World after world would fall beneath the domination of the Cyclan each to be melded into a common whole. Waste would be eliminated, the poverty which represented it, the suffering which was detrimental to maximum effort, the duplication born of competition. All that was nonproductive would be eliminated. Nothing would be initiated other than on the basis of optimum gain in reward for effort expended.
An ideal created in distant ages by those with vision and the dedication to devote their lives to its culmination. A universe governed by the dictates of efficiency, logic and reason-free of the hampering poison of emotional disorder.