Chapter 38
Vendacious’ airship was slightly smaller than Tycoon’s. Tycoon could believe that he was the star of this operation. Inside, of course … that was a different story. Tycoon did not come here; Vendacious could do as he pleased. Tycoon had staterooms and crew quarters. Vendacious had room for cargo and cages and weapons. Crew could sleep at their posts. Tycoon had his command deck high in the bow, unbalancing his ship and isolating him from his servants. Vendacious ruled from his ship’s control gondola with just enough quilting so the crew didn’t interfere with his thinking. Instant discipline could be exercised. None of those silly speaking tubes for Vendacious. He often thought that Tycoon’s command deck was what the eight imagined of human automation. Though Tycoon would have fiercely denied it, he was a slavish admirer of almost all things human. That was just one more reason to keep humans and Tycoon from getting friendly.
“M’lord, the Pack of Packs is pulling away from us.” This news came from Vendacious’ ship’s captain, the sound focused so that only the nearest member of Vendacious could hear.
“Very good,” Vendacious replied. As he’d directed, his airship was lagging behind, keeping relatively close to the ground. Vendacious was watching with binocular telescopes, following as Tycoon flew blissfully on into the jaws of the mantises. Vendacious really didn’t want to follow, but soon he would have to expose himself to those same jaws.
He suppressed his trembling fear and concentrated on the audio from Ut. The singleton had its own perch, well away from the crew. Ut’s purpose in life had been very simple for some years now. He wore his prison around his shoulders, the radio cloak glistening black with hints of gold. Ut should be happy, though. He was treated better than most crew.
Tycoon bragged endlessly about the Radio Cloaks network. In fact, it was Vendacious who had persuaded Nevil to supply the cloaks. It was Vendacious who had winnowed hundreds of singletons to find the few who could wear the cloaks and still survive. It was Vendacious who controlled the network. All eight lived in proper fear of him. Vendacious had trained them to speak only along the paths he directed, when he directed. And he was just as careful to keep them from ever getting all their heads together. Now they were his ears across the empire: Earlier this day, he had spoken via the Ut/Ta/Fur/Il relay to Aritarmo down on the Tropical Reservation. An hour later he talked via Ut/For/Fyr to Dekutomon, on the mainland south of Hidden Island. Now he was simply listening via Ut/Zek as Tycoon used the network to make final preparations for the landing on Starship Hill.
Tycoon’s various pronouncements and directions were mainly directed at his crew. Vendacious paid a small amount of attention to that; mainly he was interested in any trouble the Ravna maggot might stir up. Abruptly, he realized that Tycoon was talking to him: “Where in hell are you, Vendacious? My lookouts have lost sight of you.”
Damn you, I’m not being a perfect target in the sky. But aloud, Vendacious said, “Sorry, my lord, sorry. We’ve had a bit of mechanical trouble, unable to make much altitude.” In fact, mountain walls loomed on either side of their path, thousands of feet of rock between his precious members and the maggots’ beam gun.
“Are you going to crash then?” said Tycoon. “I’ve told you to be more careful about repairs. It’s stupid to have your own maintenance crews.”
“Not to worry, sir. My people have a solution. You’ll be seeing us soon.” Vendacious glanced at the dataset display in front of him. The position map showed that he was running out of mountains to hide behind. He must soon decide between trusting Nevil Storherte and dropping out of the game.
“Very good then!” Their conversation was in Interpack and thus free of maggoty smart remarks. “Another thing,” continued Tycoon. “I need to talk to Nevil directly. There’s final planning—”
“I believe I’ve covered everything, my lord.” Vendacious did his best to be the middlepack in all contacts between Tycoon and humans, even—and especially—Nevil Storherte. Fortunately, Storherte really didn’t like to talk to packs. Keeping Tycoon from chatting with Nevil had been much easier than keeping the eightsome from talking to the various surviving prisoners.
Not today: “I’m sure you’ve done your best, Vendacious, but now you’re lagging and I’m less than an hour from landing. I want to ask Nevil some questions about just who is present, and the current status of the likes of Woodcarver and Flenser and—” Tycoon’s voice scaled up a couple of octaves as he spoke.
“Yes, my lord! Have you used your ordinary radio? Nevil is listening all the time via the orbiter. Now—”
“I’ve tried that! The two-legs is not replying.”
“I’ll look into it, my lord. I have agents on the ground.” And other means of communication.
“I need results on this quickly, Vendacious. As you know, the Ravna two-legs has been saying many harsh things about Nevil. Now is not the time to have her proven right.”
“I agree, sir. I’ll get back to you directly.” In this, he was utterly sincere. “I’ll be out of communication with you for a few minutes.”
“I understand. Use the cloaks network and whatever else is needed.”
Vendacious waved at Ut to stop relaying with Tycoon’s ship. Damnation. Too many problems were suddenly piling up. He should prepare for one of those problems immediately. Vendacious glanced down from his platforms, “Cargomaster!”
“Sir!”
“Bring up our special prisoners. The four goes in its usual cage, but I want Amdiranifani shackled around the bow hatch.”
The Cargomaster cowered slightly, then it hustled immediately off for the prison cells. The pack had been through this procedure before.
As for the more difficult problems: How to get in touch with Nevil? Was that maggot playing some new game? He thought he had Nevil figured out, but the prospect of facing the beam gun made him want to rethink everything. Dekutomon is close to Oobii. I could have him take Fyr and visit the maggot. If there’d been more time, that would’ve been the best approach; let Nevil know that Vendacious’ agents were everywhere, even on Nevil’s doorstep.
Or, he could use an ordinary radio to try to reach Nevil through his heavenly high orbiter. No, that was grovelling, and it hadn’t worked for Tycoon. Besides, ordinary radio might be overheard by the radio sets Tycoon had aboard Pack of Packs.
Vendacious glanced at his dataset. Right now it was displaying a map of his ground track, the ridges on either side of his ship marked with altitudes and proximity. In the early years of his exile, this dataset—Oliphaunt, Johanna had called it—had been his most precious possession, the true reason why he was so esteemed by Tycoon. Since his alliance with Nevil, the dataset had not been nearly so important an informational tool, and at the same time he had come to worry about the possibility that Nevil might be able to corrupt the device. Nevertheless, like his commset, the dataset was galactic technology, putting him on a par with the maggots. And now that Nevil controlled the starship, it was by far the most secret communication path between them.
Vendacious reached out a couple of noses and tapped the sequence of instructions that should change Oliphaunt from an atlas to a commset. Johanna had always been more adept at this than he, but then she had used it all her human life; Vendacious took considerable pride in how adept he had become with the device. There, he was in commset mode and … He noticed the red light blinking at the bottom of the display. That was the special signal he had installed; Nevil was trying to call him!
Vendacious startled into action. The parts of him nearest Ut pulled on cords that dropped heavy quilts on every side of the singleton’s perch. He checked it above and below. Now, properly pitched sounds would not be heard by Ut. Not that the Radio pack would dare to deliberately betray Vendacious, but stretched out as it was across the continent, the individual parts were scarcely more than relays. Vendacious had used that fact to snoop across hundreds of leagues—but he lived in horror that his innermost secrets might inadvertently be revealed to others.
He tapped a snout at the dataset, initiating a call, but with the sounds shifted way up into frequencies so high that they came close to interfering with thought. Such squeaking would never penetrate the quilts that surrounded Ut; no chance that dear Tycoon would be bothered by inadvertent relays.
“Vendacious here,” he said, squeaking soft and super-high himself. Oliphaunt dataset had Tinishly good hearing. Somewhere inside, it transformed Vendacious’ voice into digital (whatever that was) and boosted it out to Nevil. Vendacious’ heads hurt when he tried to imagine all the things the dataset did automatically. Somewhere out among the stars, there were things worth fearing.
Some seconds passed. Was he going to have to leave a message?
Then Nevil’s upshifted voice came from the dataset: “Why in hell are you flying so low, man?”
Vendacious suppressed a snarl. Aloud, he made a noncommittal human noise.
“Never mind,” the maggot continued. “We’ve got a problem. You told me Johanna was out of the picture.”
“Of course. Torn to pieces.” But suddenly Vendacious had a very bad feeling.
“She was on your frigging fleet!”
“But I saw her die. You were listening yourself.”
“Well, I just saw her alive through trusted video. Now we know why we haven’t had contact with the rafts. Powers on High, Vendacious! How could you?”
Vendacious’ jaws snapped. If the maggot had been physically present, he would have lost his one and only throat. “You think I arranged this complication?” he said.
“I, no.” Nevil’s voice was choppy, as if he were trotting or climbing stairs; humans were such simple animals that they couldn’t disguise that sort of thing. “Look, things are a bit dicey here. If we bring this off, Woodcarver will be so discredited that she won’t dare grab power. My sisters and brothers will be safe. We can make something of this miserable exile—with your help of course. You can have all this damn world when we are done with it, but—”
Vendacious’ spies often reported that Nevil was wonderfully persuasive with his fellow larvae. That was very difficult to believe. The maggot had never sounded like anything but a crude manipulator to Vendacious.
In a way, that was comforting. Vendacious let Nevil rattle on for a moment more. When the maggot came to a natural pause, Vendacious had something reasonable and constructive to say: “All agreed, of course. The question is, what should we do about this unpleasant surprise?”
“Well, I’ve already done what was necessary. That’s one reason I’m so pissed.” Nevil explained how he had blasted Johanna and a crowd of maggots into superheated steam. “The beam killed six of my brothers and sisters. We Children count, Vendacious! I need every one of them to work with me.” He was silent for a moment.
Was he inviting a reply? Vendacious couldn’t think of anything non-sarcastic; finally, he responded, “So this has damaged your credibility.”
Nevil gave a sour laugh. “I’m not an idiot. Used this way, beam gun targets just explode. You know, like a bomb. I’ve made a big deal of the terrorist factions within the Tropicals—it’s what today’s ‘peace treaty’ meeting is all about. So the story is, Tinish dissidents on the barge fleet tried to sabotage Tycoon’s generous gift. There are rough edges, but I can make it work. If anything, this will strengthen our current position—but that’s not the point!”
“Indeed not,” said Vendacious. “So you actually saw Johanna die?”
“Ah…” the human had the grace to acknowledge the irony. “Okay, not exactly. It looked like the guys on the pier were walking someone toward shore. And the instant I fired, Oobii lost contact with that broken radio we’d been tracking.”
“That sounds even less certain than what I managed in the Tropics.” Vendacious had hated Johanna Olsndot for so long. In a very real sense, she was responsible for the debacle of ten years ago. Tycoon might be surprised to learn that Vendacious hated Johanna even more than Tycoon did—and for much better reason. “Nevil, I think our problem may be more serious than explaining a little gunfire. At least we should plan for the possibility that Johanna is still out there, actively seeking allies.”
Nevil was silent for a moment. It sounded like he had just moved out of doors or turned up one of his mechanical sound-dampers. Then: “Yeah … Bili made pretty much the same point. He thinks we should switch over to my backup plan.”
Vendacious shrugged angrily and put a certain bluff irritation into his voice: “Nonsense. That’s defeatism.” Without Ravna’s technical support, and now with Woodcarver’s active opposition, Nevil’s position in the Domain had become steadily more difficult. In some ways that was good; it made the maggot easier to manipulate. Unfortunately, it also meant he had increasing interest in his “backup plan.” That scheme might make sense in the long run—for Nevil—but it would render him almost useless to Vendacious.
“Nevil, I, um, beg you to stick with our grand plan. Let’s think on other options we can exercise if problems arise.”
“Okay, suppose Tycoon lands and behaves even more the fool than usual. Suppose he insists that Bergsndot and Jo’s little brother accompany him on stage, in front of all the Children. And then—”
“Yes, that would be bad, but—”
Nevil’s voice rode over his words: “—and then suppose Johanna has miraculously survived and teamed up with Woodcarver? She could upstage us all—and I can’t kill everybody!”
Vendacious gave a derisive hoot. “Johanna couldn’t speak a single syllable before Tycoon would rip her throat out.” Nevil simply didn’t understand Tycoon’s hatred for that particular two-legs.
“Worst case, Vendacious, I’m talking worst case. I know the Ravna bitch is an idiot; she couldn’t convince a friendly audience that the sun is going to rise tomorrow. And Jefri Olsndot is just a follower. But they’ve had several days to chat up your idiot, right?”
Vendacious ground his teeth as he replied, “I’ve been following that; I’m in control of the situation.”
“You’re betting a lot on that assessment, my friend. What are we going to do if Tycoon gets turned?”
Vendacious didn’t have to think too hard on that. “Ultimately, Tycoon is simply a tool, a very very valuable tool. If he ever figures out the full truth of things, then he must be immediately destroyed.… Um.” And what would that mean in the present situation? “If you and I coordinate on this … we could cover all the possibilities. If I determine that Tycoon has gone bad, I will immediately tell you. So if your ‘worst case’ materializes—”
“Then I would fry them both?… Okay. I could say I was trying to protect Johanna but that Oobii glitched. The weapons Down Here are so crude I might be able to make that story work.”
“Fine. But remember, killing Tycoon is truly a last resort. We need him more than I think you know. Even if Johanna pops out in front of him, don’t just kill Tycoon. I’m confident he will quickly destroy her, but I’ll signal you otherwise.”
“Ah. So you’re going to come out of hiding then?”
Sigh. “Indeed. I’ll circle overhead in honor of this historic meeting of our races.”
They briefly chatted about details, and Vendacious mentioned Tycoon’s demand to speak with Nevil.
“Yeah, I noticed he was pinging me.” Nevil was silent for a moment. There were human-sounding voices in the background. Nevil continued: “I don’t want to talk to that shithead now. I’ve got to get on stage myself. What does he want to talk about anyway?”
“I think he wants some kind of last-minute reassurance about the situation with Woodcarver and Flenser.”
“The idiot! There is no last-minute reassurance; that’s why getting this meeting right is so important. Okay. I’ll talk to him when I get to the stage area.” And then Nevil signed off. At least that was what the symbol on the dataset’s display indicated. As far as Vendacious could tell, the dataset did not covertly transmit to the two-legs. Given that Oliphaunt was Johanna’s toy and it had never been in Nevil’s hands, Vendacious was inclined to think it was not corrupted by him. With the two-legs’ gadgets, you never knew for sure. When Vendacious did things Nevil must not know, he locked the dataset away and used the Radio Cloak network. He had ten years of evidence that the starship could not snoop on mindsounds.
Speaking of which, he should talk to Tycoon to claim credit for Nevil’s upcoming call—
The thought was interrupted by whistling cries of anticipated pain. The Cargomaster dragged Amdiranifani into the space below Vendacious, then fastened the pack’s neck collars to the garrote stands that ringed the bow hatch. As the Cargomaster left the area to bring in the other prisoner, Vendacious leaned down a head to inspect Amdiranifani. The eight heard him and shrank back.
Vendacious smiled. Intelligent victims were always entertaining. They thought they could outwit their torturer—and after you broke them, their own imagination became your best ally. Without a doubt, Amdiranifani was the most brilliant victim Vendacious had ever had. This eightsome had come a long way down. In the first day or two, it had actually tried to suborn crew and radio with covert speech, echoing threads of sound that evaded Vendacious’ hearing. The arrogance of the eight, to think it could bring off such a scheme. Vendacious had let Amdiranifani hope for three full days. Apprehension had been sweet, the punishment tuned to the victim: Vendacious had gouged out two of Amdiranifani’s eyes. Just two, just eyes—and then he had called on his victim to imagine how much worse the punishment could be. For this pack, with its imagination, the effect was as devastating as cracking half its tympana, or killing a member outright. And the mild punishment left so much more for Vendacious to work with.…
Amdiranifani was making little squeaking noises, fighting within himself for the courage to speak.
Vendacious raised the tip of one nose, a gesture that normally preceded harsh punishment during interrogation. Amdiranifani froze into terrified silence.
“Ah, my dear Amdiranifani. So sorry for the poor view you have down there. Don’t worry, you may yet hear some interesting things. Here’s something very important: Think quietly. Remain speech silent, except where I give you leave to speak.” He raised a second nose, also a signal he had used during interrogations, when an absolute order was given. There was nothing this creature could say that would make any difference, but Vendacious wanted any screams of pain that leaked across the radio net to be under his own control. “If you disobey—well, I think you know where you’re standing.” Vendacious gestured at the bow hatch in the middle of Amdiranifani. “Take that as your suspended sentence. I would just as soon have you be seven or six or even five. It would be a pleasure to throw some of you to the winds, and I could tell Tycoon you were trying to escape and overreached yourself. You have no doubt of me, do you?”
Here and there, Amdiranifani’s heads dipped in trembling acknowledgment. Just last night, Vendacious had thrown one of his own crew’s members out that hatch—and made sure that Amdiranifani had witnessed the discipline. Whether dealing with a single member or a whole pack, Vendacious always enjoyed such punishment. Usually the victim was a prisoner, but killing an occasional malingering bit of crew did wonders to encourage good performance from the rest.
Cargomaster was bringing in the foursome, all that was left of my lord Steel. This prisoner was not so manageable. It was enraged beyond fear, and not very intelligent—ordinarily not an entertaining combination. This remnant of Steel had become steadily more killing crazy as the days passed, perhaps recalling its old hatreds. Its insanity exploded whenever it came within ear- or eyeshot of Amdiranifani. The four bounced off the walls of its cage, searching for some way out, shrieking murder at the eightsome. Remnant Steel and Amdiranifani’s own imagination kept Amdiranifani forever at the edge of collapse.
If only I had this strong a hold on the humans with Tycoon. Vendacious eyed Amdiranifani speculatively. Avoiding Nevil’s “worst case” might come down to whether maggots Jefri and Ravna would keep silent if the alternative was to see pieces of their dear friend raining from the sky.
• • •
Now Ravna could see Newcastle town and Oobii. Both Tycoon (with his telescopes) and Jefri claimed there were crowds on the heather southeast of town.
“I have them in sight, too,” came Vendacious’ voice. His airship was rapidly catching up. “That’s where the great meeting is to be, my lord. Nevil has constructed a stage there and cleared a landing field, just as we agreed.”
“And he’ll call the moment he arrives?” said Tycoon.
“Yes, my lord, direct to your ordinary radio. Do you have—”
“Hello? Hello?” That was Nevil’s voice, coming from an analog radio by Tycoon’s thrones. In the background there were human voices, and the sound of whipping wind.
Tycoon leaned toward the radio box and said, “Greetings, Lord Nevil.” The portentous words sounded incongruous in his frightened little girl voice.
“Yes. Well … Greetings to you, too.” Nevil’s voice clipped in and out. She heard snippets of confident-sounding advice he was giving to someone near him. Ah. Nevil must be wearing the single remaining HUD, using it to maintain two conversation streams. “Okay, I’m back. Everybody can see your airships now. They’re waving. I’m about to go up on stage, give everybody a pep talk. Woodcarver is already up there, but she’s cooperating. Too many other people really want this alliance. Everything is under control and per our previous discussions.” Ravna almost smiled. She had never heard Nevil Storherte sound, well, frazzled. “So, um, are you ready for our meeting, sir?”
“We are on schedule as well,” said Tycoon, “but I have several questions.”
“Yes, sir?”
“First, are you hiding Johanna Olsndot?” The whole pack was watching Ravna and Jefri.
“What? No!” Nevil’s voice clipped out for a second. “Why in heaven’s name would you ask me that? Haven’t I—”
“You’ve been very helpful on this issue in the past. I thank you for that.” Tycoon was still watching Ravna and Jef. “But at the same time I know you were—mutually promised? sex-involved?—with Johanna. Even humans must have some forms of loyalty, so I wanted to ask.”
“Mister, I assure you that after what Johanna did, I have no loyalty towards her!”
“Very well then. I just wanted to ask.”
“Are your other questions as interesting?”
“You can be the judge of that,” said Tycoon, and proceeded into the fine points of who would be seated where onstage, and where Woodcarver might have security packs, and how they were armed. Vendacious would circle overhead while Lord Tycoon was on the ground. Finally, Tycoon said, “This all sounds very good, my lord Nevil. Thank you. I will see you on the ground in a few minutes.”
“Yes, sir,” said Nevil, “I look forward to making our alliance official.” He was sounding something like his normal diplomatic self. “Ah, one other thing, my lord Tycoon. For best effect, I recommend that you not speak with your human voice. Use Tinish. More dignified, don’t you think?”
Tycoon cocked his heads. “My use of your language is poor?”
“Not at all!” protested Nevil. In fact, Tycoon spoke better Samnorsk than most Starship Hill packs. Nevil must be worried about the Geri voice; that by itself would betray Nevil’s lies. “It’s just that … um … speaking Tinish will seem so much more dignified. More powerful, too.”
Vendacious put in, “I’ll be happy to translate, anonymously of course.”
Tycoon admired himself for a moment. “Yes … I see your point. Very well.”
“Excellent. I must go onstage now. Talk to you in person soon.”
After a moment, the little analog radio emitted background static; no one was transmitting to it. Two of Tycoon picked up the device and a third head punched a button in the side; even the static ceased.
Tycoon set down the device and looked around the command deck. “Of course, he’s lying about Johanna.”
“Huh?” said Jefri. Vendacious gobbled similar surprise, and some kind of question.
“Yes, Vendacious. Well you might ask.” Tycoon’s stare returned to Ravna and Jefri. “You see, since we’ve had specimens, I have become a great student of human nature. In fact, understanding them is not that difficult; they are such simple creatures, with such simple motivations. While I was talking to Nevil, I was watching these two here. Both realized that Nevil is lying.” He spoke with the confidence of a real expert—or a revenge-obsessed nutcase.
“See?” He waved at Jefri. “The Johanna-brother is speechless. I have found him out yet again. And you, Ravna. Can you honestly say that Nevil was telling the truth?”
How would I know? I’m not sure I’ve ever heard Nevil telling the truth. Hope and fear chased around in her head, and she was as silent as Jefri.
Vendacious was not so shy. “My lord, I would never have guessed, but it … it could be so. These next few hours, I will watch for signs of other lies.”
• • •
They were about ten kilometers from Starship Hill. Ravna had flown over this area often enough—both with Pilgrim, and in recent times on Scrupilo’s little airboat. Below were the merged farms of the Margrum River Valley. To the west, the edge of the sea cliffs was obvious now. Just on this side of the edge, the town houses stood along the Queen’s Road. Newcastle town sprawled to the north, climbing right up to the marble dome of the castle itself.
Tycoon’s attention was spread across several tasks, talking on the speaking tubes with his pilots, watching ahead, occasionally chatting with his advisors. Vendacious claimed to have Amdi on his ship’s command deck, and had persuaded him to cooperate in providing information. “I’ll trust the pack for nothing critical of course,” said Vendacious, “but he’s lived near Starship Hill all his life. And he knows that lying will be strictly punished.”
“I don’t know,” Tycoon replied, even as he continued to talk to his own crew via speaking tubes. “I wouldn’t trust a prisoner’s word at a moment like this.”
“Ah, but I also have agents on the ground.”
“Dekutomon?”
“He’s the most important, my lord. He’s near the landing spot and he is with the radio cloak Fyr.”
“Good! I had wondered what you did with Fyr! So Nevil can’t hear what Dekutomon is telling us?”
“Indeed, my lord.”
Tycoon gobbled something that meant oops, and made some hasty correction to what he was saying to his crew of pilots. In Samnorsk he said, “Very good, Vendacious. Now I should concentrate on this landing.” Tycoon looked mainly forward, with two of himself on the binoculars. Apparently he intended to manage the landing directly, using the speaking tubes to specify every smallest detail to the real crew. It was typical Tycoon foolishness.
Mercifully, Vendacious and the other various advisors were silent for a time. There was just Zek, every fifteen seconds or so, calling out range information in precise Samnorsk units:
“Altitude 750 meters, range to touchdown 3300 meters.”
“Altitude 735 meters, range to touchdown 3150 meters.”
“Altitude 720 meters, range to touchdown 3005 meters.”
None of Tycoon looked around, but he made an approving sound. “Very good, Vendacious! Your ranging information is making this much easier.”
Ravna had seen no evidence that Tycoon’s operation had any location technology beyond the natural sonar Tines were born with. Where were those numbers coming from?
Jefri gave her a little nudge and nodded in the direction of Zek. The singleton was looking back at them. It turned, stared for a moment at the landscape ahead—
“Altitude 705 meters, range to touchdown 2850 meters.”
Then its eyes were back on Ravna and Jefri. The creature was all but quivering with tension, as if to will them to understand something more than the numbers. What was behind those eyes? The two airships must be less than a kilometer apart, so Zek and Ut were essentially together. Dekutomon’s Fyr was probably closer than it had ever been before. That meant that Mr. Radio was at least a threesome. There were likely two others fairly close, one that had been used for long-range relay to Fyr and one at the head of the chain to the Tropics. Right now the radio pack could easily be a fully-connected fivesome, perhaps even smarter than the night it had linked them with Amdi.
Maybe such a pack couldn’t run a full Man-in-the-Middle, but all it had to do was not relay all it heard from here. If it was willing to risk its life.… She glanced at Jefri. He was as pale as he could be, stricken. He gave her a nod, understanding.
Meantime, Zek still looked at them, intent. The creature had made a brave offer. Okay. Ravna nodded at him, and quietly asked something that might be innocuous even if it were relayed to listeners up and down Mr. Radio’s network: “How many are you?”
“I’m between five and eight,” Radio replied. “depending on sky bounce reception. We must be quick.”
Tycoon was preoccupied with his speaking tubes and binoculars, but now one of him glanced up, curious at the strange conversation. He gobbled a query wrapped around the Tinish for “Vendacious.”
Zek shrank back on his perch, but his reply was Samnorsk: “Not Vendacious at the moment, sir. This is myself, Radio.”
Another head came up. “So you’re really all of one mind? Remarkable. What does Vendacious think of this?”
Zek cringed a bit lower. “Vendacious doesn’t know, sir. I’m not relaying this conversation.”
Tycoon made a surprised noise. He angled some heads at the speaking tubes and emitted a single chord that meant “carry on.” Then all his attention returned to Zek: “Why not?”
“I … I’m his victim, sir. I beg you to keep this conversation secret.”
Tycoon shrugged. “Perhaps. So you must be passing lies on to Vendacious then?”
“No! I used your voice, but only to elaborate on what you said, that you need to concentrate on your landing.”
“And the numbers you were saying to me? They are lies too?”
“No, they come from combining the view from my Ut and Zek and Fyr. Just as I began the deception, I lost part of myself, and was afraid to say anything to you at all. Amdiranifani thought—”
“Ah. Amdiranifani.” Tycoon nodded. “So he’s been operating right under Vendacious’ snouts. Amazing.”
Zek’s voiced gained a little confidence. “Yes, sir. I couldn’t do this without him and the crazy soundpaths he dances around the control gondola. When my radio mind weakens, he makes suggestions.”
Half of Tycoon was looking at Jef and Ravna now. The pack’s whole aspect was a ferocious smile. “I understand. Amdiranifani is even more remarkable than Vendacious claims. He has made a puppet out of my radio network.”
“No, please! I am not a puppet—”
Tycoon voice rolled over the protest: “Just listen to this, Amdiranifani!” He grabbed up his voice-band radio and waved it at Zek. The two airships were so close that this device would surely work.
“No, no, no. Please don’t betray me—” Zek’s Samnorsk dissolved into Tinish, and then not even that. A bubbling noise emerged from the singleton’s mouth, a sound that Ravna had never heard from Tines before.
Jefri was on his feet, shouting. Behind him, the gunpack had surged out of the stairwell.
And they were both trumped by the squall of outrage that came from the other side of the chamber: Ritl bounced off her perch, blathering as loud as she had when Ravna first met her. She ran across the deck to Tycoon’s thrones, shrieking at him one and all. Then she danced sideways till she was standing in front of Zek. She turned, snapping belligerently.
Tycoon waved the gunpack back. Then he shifted position slightly and focused a roar down upon Ritl. This level of sound was a weapon. The singleton was knocked off her feet. Even outside of the focus, the noise was a spike of pain in Ravna’s ears.
Ritl lay on her back, twitching. Finally she rolled over and belly-crawled back toward her perch, Tycoon’s gaze following her centimeter by centimeter. When she was under the partial cover of the perch, she emitted a defiant little squawk.
Tycoon stared at Ritt for a long moment. Then he put down the analog radio and said to Zek, “Have your say.”
Zek didn’t reply immediately. He looked dazed, maybe by the splash of Tycoon’s roar, maybe by the terror of the moment before. “Thank you, sir,” The creature hesitated. “There will be interruptions. I wasn’t able to entirely disguise—” Abruptly he was gobbling Interpack, some kind of question.
Tycoon answered in Samnorsk, “Give me a moment, Vendacious! This landing is tricky.” He gestured for Zek to relay his words.
And Vendacious replied, “Indeed, my lord! Sorry for interrupting!”
In fact, it looked to Ravna as though the Pack of Packs crew was doing just fine without any micro-managing from Tycoon. The ship wasn’t more than a thousand meters from touchdown. Ahead was familiar ground, Murder Meadows. It was the nearest open ground to the city. Today the heather was festive with crowds and banners.
But Tycoon continued, “In fact, we may still be too high. I’m going to circle the landing area and try again. It will give me more time to be sure of the ground.”
“As you say, my lord.” Then Vendacious’ voice brightened. “I imagine the maneuver will impress Woodcarver’s subjects.”
“Follow me, then.” Tycoon didn’t say anything for a moment, but he was watching Zek.
“I’ve resumed faking the relay, sir,” Mr. Radio Cloaks said.
“Good. We’ll have few minutes to chat then.” Tycoon looked almost gleeful; the geeky side of him must find this deception fascinating. He said something into a speaking tube. Almost immediately the engines buzzed louder. The airship turned and they could see Newcastle town spread out below them.
Tycoon sobered and he gave Zek a sharp look. “Well? You have your time. Speak!”
Zek sat a little straighter: “Thank you sir. I’ve rarely been a person, and never for very long. But at this moment, I am eight. Vendacious can’t keep his secrets from me, not all of them. He is the king of lies, sir, and the king of death. He kills and kills—his own people!”
“So? Overthrow him.”
“You don’t know much about killing, do you, sir? If you kill often enough, and cleverly enough, you can build a palace of terror. Someday it may fall, but just the thought of that is enough to be murdered for.”
“Until Amdiranifani came along?”
Zek gave a one-headed nod. “Until Amdiranifani and the good radio conditions that my parts have been wishing for the last tenday. A word from you, sir, just a word of hope. It could make the difference. It could bring Vendacious down.”
Tycoon made a disbelieving sound. “I know Vendacious treats his prisoners harshly, sometimes his employees too. I’ve curbed the worst excesses. And his spies gets results. He gets results. Can you gainsay that?”
“Yes!” But now Zek seemed to lose track of the conversation. His eyes became unfocused. “Sorry. I’m down to three. A moment—”
Murder Meadows slid beneath the airship. Now they could see downslope to Hidden Island and beyond, but the real spectacle was Oobii. They would be flying along the starship’s length. Oobii’s drive spines drooped around her and the ones underneath were crushed, but the ship still gleamed greenfly bright. Even packs who didn’t know what that ship had been were overcome by its beauty. Ravna noticed that Tycoon’s members were all staring at the ship, almost as distracted as Zek, but for different reasons.
Mr. Radio resumed, “Vendacious murdered gobble and gobble”—these were names Ravna didn’t recognize—“when they gained too much favor with you. He murdered the human, Edvi Verring, ran him into the Choir land, then told you that he died of the bloat.”
Tycoon turned a head back to Zek and commented, “Vendacious offered to let us see the remains.”
“A ploy, sir. Recall, he made the offer to Ravna and Timor. He’s convinced Timor that Edvi might still live. Vendacious uses hostages for everything. Even when the hostages are dead, he still uses them.”
“That’s far-fetched. I could have asked to see the remains.”
Mr. Radio replied abruptly: “You could have, but you didn’t. Even if you had, Vendacious would have had some explanation you would accept. In the year that I can remember, your gullibility has shown no bounds.” He hesitated and Zek shrank back from his standing posture. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
Tycoon didn’t react except to raise one snout ironically, “You plead a little radio interference, do you?”
“No, sir,” the words came softly, “that was from all of me.” Maybe, but Zek looked confused now. “In the time I have, I don’t know quite what more to say…” He glanced across at Jefri and then continued, “There is the murder and the lie that made all the rest possible. Vendacious killed Scriber Jaqueramaphan. Then he lied to say that Johanna—”
“Yes, yes, you don’t have to repeat that claim.” Tycoon nodded at Jefri. “I hear your friend Amdiranifani behind these pleadings.” But Tycoon did not really sound enraged. Most of him was still staring outwards. Oobii filled the view, its stately curves sweeping past, its drive spines arching so close you might think to reach out and touch them. There was a kind of awed distraction in Tycoon’s posture. “Scriber would have loved you humans,” he said. “He was such an innocent and impractical person. Before we seperated, I—we—were more creative than any sane businesspack. We were so successful we couldn’t keep up with all our ventures. So we decided to become two, one pack to specialize in practice and the other in farthest imagination. One was to be the steady businesspack, one the flying imagination. Scriber kept notebooks of his inventions. I worked to expand our businesses while he created.
“In his notebooks, he had flying machines and tunnelers and submersible boats. There’s only one problem with going from a notebook idea to a salable product. Well, no. There are ten thousand thousand problems. Most of his inventions depended on materials that didn’t exist, on engines more powerful than any we could make, on precision of manufacture that he barely had words for. He diverted our company into debacle after debacle. We had been so beautiful before…” All Tycoon’s heads were drooping. “In the end, I—the creature of business and common sense—couldn’t tolerate Scriber’s endless, brilliant failures. I forced him out of the business. He was agreeable enough. I … think … he understood why we had come to an end. He cashed out and left for the West.” Tycoon jabbed a snout at Jef and Ravna. “I know Scriber befriended you people. I know he was both too clever and too naive to survive the meeting. What did he discover about you two-legs? Why would this Johanna murder him in pieces, till all of him was dead?”
Poor Jefri was beyond indignation, perhaps beyond rage. He sat back, his mouth opening and closing in silent shock. Ravna put her arm across his shoulders. Let me try, one more time. She looked at Tycoon. “I never met Scriber Jaqueramaphan,” Ravna said. “But I know him through Johanna. She loved him. Her greatest shame is that she didn’t respect him enough. He died because he was trying to protect her, but it was Vendacious who murdered him. Won’t you even consider that possibility? Even after an, an employee has risked his life to tell you?”
Tycoon hesitated. “If that really is my employee and not just Amdiranifani’s speaking tube.… You and I have talked about this before. I have always taken these matters seriously. I have interviewed witnesses. Nevil himself—”
Zek interrupted with a long gobble, complaining about something or other.
Tycoon visibly pulled himself together. Then two of him leaned out from their thrones, looking almost straight down from the vertex of the bow. “Yes, Vendacious. I see it.”
There was more gobbling from Zek.
“Oh?” said Tycoon. “Woodcarver thinks that, does she? Well you tell Nevil to tell her that—” and then he was speaking Interpack, too.
Ravna glanced at Jefri. He gave his head a little shake, but kept silent. A moment later, she saw what was under discussion. There was a third aircraft, below and ahead of them. It was Scrupilo’s little airboat, the original Eyes Above. The boat was flying in its own circle over the field.
As the Pack of Packs continued on its course, the two craft came closer, but now the airboat was turning away, heading over the Inland Straits, perhaps to Scrupilo’s labs on Hidden Island. She glimpsed a pack in the gondola; it flipped a member impudently at them. I’ll bet that’s Scrupilo himself. She could imagine him and Woodcarver desperately trying to put the brakes on Nevil’s “Alliance for Peace.”
Zek was making genial laughing noises. Then he spoke in Samnorsk, with Vendacious’ voice. “Woodcarver’s balloon has run away, my lord. One little threat from Nevil was all it took.”
“Indeed,” said Tycoon, though he watched the departing airboat with only a single pair of eyes. The rest of him was looking ahead. “In less than half a turn we’ll be back in landing position, Vendacious.”
“We are still tracking directly behind you, my lord. We’ll continue on our course as you land. Please keep in touch via the network.”
Tycoon turned a couple of heads to look at Zek. The poor creature had collapsed on his perch. He looked very tired, past coherent fear. Ravna guessed that relaying was all he could manage now. More of Tycoon looked around, glancing at Jefri and Ravna. He cocked his heads as if indecisive. Would he betray Zek and his peers? But then all he said was, “Very good. I’ll keep Zek close.”
• • •
Airships might look like some flyers of the Beyond, but the only real similarity was that both could float in the air. Airships were fragile balloons, slaves to the atmosphere. Landing an airship was an enormously awkward exercise, at least if you didn’t have reasonable automation, or trained ground crews.
As they descended upon the meadow, Tycoon had six heads forward, staring down and forward. This time, he wasn’t bothering his pilot. Every meter of descent was a balance of ballast and fine maneuver. They were now so low that most of Newcastle town was above them. Nevil’s open-air stage was at far end of the field, but dozens of humans and even more packs were running along below the airship. Ahead were clusters of younger Children let out of their Academy classes. The colors were festival cheerful, as if the crowds were welcoming back far explorers.
Suddenly the ship’s engines buzzed louder, and the deck shivered beneath her. She could see the tiny heather flowers just beyond the bow window. Still under power, the ship was motionless. Depending on how much lift gas the pilot had vented, they might be floating like thistledown. Then the engines died. She heard crunching noises as the airship was drawn down to the vegetation.
Humans and Tines rolled tie-down weights across the ground just in front of the bow. She recognized faces. These were people from Scrupilo’s ground crew. Tycoon watched with nervous twitches.
Zek was relaying assurances in Tinish, presumably from Vendacious circling above, but Tycoon seemed more interested in what he could see and what he was hearing via the speaking tubes from his own crew. Now he hopped down from his thrones and padded past Ravna and Jefri to the spiral stairs. He was giving orders in all directions, though Ravna could understand only a little.
Jefri looked surprised by something the pack was saying. “Hei, I think Tycoon wants us to accompany him.”
Zek got down from his perch and almost tripped on his cloak. Ritl ran to him and made encouraging noises. Zek didn’t seem especially frightened; he rearranged his cloak and walked over to Ravna and Jefri. When he spoke, it was Vendacious: “Ah, the humans. What to do with you? M’lord Tycoon says it’s safe to take you outside, that your presence will disarm the likes of Woodcarver.”
The gunpack had two heads stuck up from the stairwell. It waggled a snout in Zek’s direction, evidently telling him to get a move on. Zek started toward the stairs, but he seemed to be getting conflicting orders. He stopped to relay one more piece of advice from Vendacious: “I hope my lord Tycoon is right in this—but keep in mind that I am watching from above. I will use Amdiranifani to assure that you do not make trouble.” Then he followed the gunpack down the stairs.