James P. Hogan (16 page)

Korshak was smiling to himself, already picturing Masumichi in disguise. Parthesa had been the general name for the eastern half of Asia, over which he had roamed for many years. Korshak caught Ronti’s eye and saw he was thinking the same thing.

“So did you ever hear from him again?” Korshak asked, keeping a straight face.

Osgar shook his head. “What would have been the point? All I could tell him was the same as I’ve just told you. He went away, and that was the last I heard of it.” He paused and reflected for a moment, then emitted a snort that bordered on a snigger. “So, what’s going on? I wouldn’t have thought that much around here would interest robots, if you know what I mean. But anyway, how can you lose one? It’s not exactly something that’s going to blend into the crowd.”

“That’s what we’re trying to find out, Osgar,” Korshak said.

A low
pinggg
sounded somewhere below the level of the bar. Osgar glanced down. “Oh, someone needs service. I’ll be back in a moment.” He came around the bar and went away to take an order at one of the booths. Korshak tried more of the Envoy. Ronti did likewise.

“Not bad,” Korshak pronounced. “Os was right. Almost a taste of the old brews.”

“It reminds me of the one you liked in that tavern we used to stay at in Belamon,” Ronti said.

“Ah yes, Belamon.” Korshak smiled at the recollection.

“One of the most profitable pieces of magic we ever did.”

The town’s councilors had invited Korshak to put on a show in a festival that they were organizing, and then quibbled over the payment that they had agreed to. Within twenty-four hours of Korshak and Ronti’s leaving, the town was hit by a freak storm that devastated the seafront and harbor. The townspeople attributed it to Korshak’s powers and insisted on reparation, and an emissary from the council caught up with Korshak’s wagon the following day to deliver double the amount owed.

“So Masumichi has already been here,” Ronti said. “It would have saved us a lot of trouble if he’d told us.”

“Maybe he credits us with greater powers of divination than…” Korshak began, and then stopped as he realized that a girl who had been alone at one of the nearby tables had got up and was coming over to them. She was maybe in her mid-twenties, slimly built, with long dark hair tied back in a clip, and wearing a short, capelike jacket over a sparkly top and tight-fitting pants. Her face had the undecided look of someone not wanting to intrude but needing to say something. Korshak twitched his mouth upward at the corners and raised his eyebrows inquiringly.

“You’re the illusionist,” she said. “I saw that levitation act with your wife about a month ago, when she was dressed as a princess. They say you’ll be doing a show at Beach.”

“We hope so, anyway,” Korshak replied. “It’s still being talked about.” Inwardly, he prepared himself for an explanation of how he had done this trick or that trick, or perhaps being solicited to take on an apprentice. It happened all the time.

But the girl continued, “I recognized you, so I was interested, and I couldn’t help overhearing a bit. It sounded as if you were asking about a robot.”

“That’s right,” Korshak confirmed. “One was brought to Istella as part of a research program. It was supposed to meet someone here but didn’t show up. We’re trying to get a lead on it.”

“I saw one here,” the girl said.

“In the Rainbow?”

“No, but in Bruso, near here.”

“When was this?”

“Around a couple of weeks ago.”

Korshak shot Ronti a quick glance and looked back. “That sounds like the one. Where did you see it?”

“Do you know the place where the Mediators come and preach?”

Korshak shook his head. “Not really. We only come here once in a while.”

The Mediators were a mystical-religious cult that had roots in a variety of practices and belief systems brought from Earth. They had opposed the Istella project but been too small at the time of its inception to change the outcome. Since then, they had grown sufficiently to jointly found their own daughter world, called Etanne, along with several other sects professing a similar need for seclusion and an environment unimpaired by worldly distractions.

“It’s just off the Square,” the girl told them. “There was a robot there, watching them. It seemed really interested. There are probably Mediators down there today. I can take you there if you like.”

The girl’s name was Brel. She lived and worked on Istella, she said, but didn’t go into details. Originally from Sofi, she had been brought up to the
Aurora
as a young girl, spent most of the time since then in Jakka, and moved out to be on her own a little over a year ago. Her family back there were “okay, but kind of stifling.” She had a twin sister who was “Miss Perfect,” she added, making a face, as if that explained everything.

A small crowd had collected in a corner of the Square, where broad steps led down into a sunken rectangular area below a terrace bathed in light from the entrance to a casino and club. A platform with a rostrum was set up at the end opposite the steps, around which several figures in long robes with the hoods thrown back were proffering leaflets. On the platform a bearded man, similarly clad, was speaking below a sign that read: transcend!

“He’s the same one who was talking when the robot was here,” Brel said.

“How about the others with him?” Korshak asked.

“I’m… not sure.”

Korshak glanced at Ronti, who returned a what’s-to-lose? look. They descended the few steps and moved closer behind the small crowd of listeners. The expressions and attitudes told mainly of the curiosity that draws people to anything different. An incenselike fragrance pervaded the air, no doubt associated with a bluish smoke arising from a source somewhere at the front.

“Yes, brothers and sisters, on all sides you see man-made wonders. Indeed, the very worlds you live among are wonders, every inch of them the product of human ingenuity that can only be described as breathtaking. It would be foolish to deny that, and Mediators would be the last to belittle achievements of which every one of you has the right to be proud – and should be proud!” The speaker’s tone was rich and powerful. He paused and looked around, dark eyes scanning the faces, and then raised a warning finger. “But we must not allow justifiable pride in what we are to turn into the conceit of imagining we are all that can be. The universe that we see, awe inspiring and magnificent though it may be, is merely a shadow of a vaster reality that is not apprehended by the ordinary senses.”

“How do you know, then?” somebody near the front challenged.

“Because I have trained my senses to reach beyond the range of the ordinary,” the speaker answered.

“That might be fine for you. But how can you convince me?”

“How can I convince a blind man that I can see?”

“That’s not the same thing. It’s easily proved. Tell him what’s across the room, then let him walk over and find out.”

“As I am, indeed, inviting you to do. But it requires more application and effort than just walking across a room.” Without waiting for a further response, the speaker went on. “In any case, it should be obvious that powers exist which operate on a level beyond anything that we are capable of. Every cell, of the trillions of cells that make up every one of you, is a microscopic, automated factory filled with molecular machinery that dwarfs the complexity of anything ever conceived by the minds of humans.” He showed his teeth briefly. “People ask me if I believe in miracles. I tell them, ‘Of course I do! You
are
one!’ “It drew some smiles.

The finger stabbed upward at the star-filled sky above the Square. “What hidden powers underlie the grandeur of the cosmos? Do you imagine it all happens for no reason, with no plan and no purpose, in the way that some, whose minds are unable to reach beyond the material and the mechanical, would have you believe? On Earth in ancient times – before its decline into the age of material distractions and self-worship that led to the Conflagration – a wisdom once existed that knew and could channel those powers. A level of mental and spiritual advancement that was able to mediate between the vaster reality and the limited realm of experience and perception that we regard as the universe and all that is….” Another pause, ushering in a louder, more strident note. “But out here, a flicker is beginning to arise once again. The retreat we have created at Etanne rejects the excesses of artificiality that make the rest of Constellation a mirror of what Earth became. Amid surroundings that bring back the peace and serenity that Earth once knew, the mind and spirit can reach out and make contact again with…”

Korshak knew the line and had no particular need to hear it again. He moved to where he could get a clearer view of the area at the front, beside the speaker’s platform. The platform with its rostrum was positioned off-center toward the crowd’s right. From it, a narrow carpet of colorful design extended leftward for perhaps seven or eight feet to a small wooden table standing on its far end. A rod projecting upward from the table’s center to a little less than shoulder height supported a metal urn in which the incense was burning. To Korshak, the setup told its own story immediately.

Bringing a carpet out for pure ornamentation to a street meeting like this would have been a needless chore and extravagance. The way it was positioned between the speaker’s platform and the table effected a superficially logical visual symmetry, but its only evident function was to serve as a totally unnecessary underlay for the table. Which meant that its real purpose had to be something else. It was concealing something. If Korshak’s guess was correct, the appearance of the table and the rod standing up from its center was deceptive. They were painted and grained to look like wood, but far from being lightweight and delicate, they were constructed from high-strength metal alloy. The carpet covered a horizontal extension to complete an L-shaped configuration that would resist tipping. The speaker was building up to a demonstration now, before everyone’s eyes, of the powers that the Mediators had learned to access. Anyone here could learn it, too. Yes, Korshak thought he had a good idea of where this was leading.

Movement nearby caught his attention. One of the acolytes was moving among the audience, distributing leaflets. Korshak accepted one obligingly.

“Don’t leave just yet,” the acolyte murmured. “The Master is about to show one of the wonders.”

“What wonder is that?” Korshak asked.

“You will soon see for yourself.”

Korshak studied his face curiously. He was young, maybe in his twenties, with yellow hair, gray, opaque eyes that revealed nothing of the person within, and lean features intensified by hollow cheeks and a narrow nose and chin. With the opportunities that abounded in
Aurora
, he could probably have become anything he chose. It had never ceased to amaze Korshak that so many people were enticed by promises of intangible magic that were never fulfilled, when all the time they were surrounded by countless visible proofs of what he still considered to be real magic. Was it just a case of familiarity dulling the senses, and the allure of the strange and the unknown? The acolyte had to know that the wonder he was peddling was faked. So what kind of rationalization did the cult instill to justify such deception and still preserve faith? There were depths to the psychology of this business, Korshak realized, that he still hadn’t plumbed.

The audience was primed now, impatient for the show. As the acolyte moved away, a girl who had been sitting out of view at the front rose to her feet. She was thin and wraithlike, dressed in an enveloping white robe secured by a cord at the waist. With the pallor of her features, Korshak’s first thought was that it could have been a shroud. Two of the other robed figures came forward, took her by the hands, and led her to the center of the strip of carpet, where she turned to face the audience expressionlessly. At the same time, the bearded Master was stepping down from the platform.

“This is Nyea,” he informed the onlookers. “Still a novice, but already attuned to actualizing and focusing energy drawn from a higher plane. In a way, like an antenna, if you will. What you are about to see cannot be explained by ordinary, materialism-based physics. Observe.”

One of the attendants had removed the urn from the top of the rod and stepped back. The other drew Nyea a few steps sideways until she was alongside the small table, and then raised her arm to shoulder height, at the same time bending it at the elbow to bring her hand, lightly closed, against the side of her head. This caused the underside of her arm just above the elbow, to where the sleeve of her robe had fallen, to rest on the ring at the top of the rod, in which the urn had rested. The attendant made a show of clasping the rod tightly with both hands, while the Master began making passes in the air, at the same time intoning a rhythmic chant that was taken up by the others, now assembled as a backing group on either side. The wraith’s eyes closed, and her face took on a distant look. Her body seemed to stiffen. Korshak glanced at his companions. Brel was watching the performance fixedly, while Ronti looked about at the reactions of the spectators. They were rapt with attention, expectations now at their highest.

Together, the Master, standing behind, and the attendant, to the side, stooped and gripped Nyea’s feet, which were adorned with just a pair of string sandals. Slowly, they lifted her feet from the ground, moving them sideways, in the direction away from the table. She remained supported by her upper arm resting on the top of the rod, still being held firmly by the other attendant. Already, there seemed something unnatural about the balance being effected. Her upper body was supported only by the rod, but it seemed stable and firm. A few murmurs of surprise went up among the audience.

They lifted and turned her slowly until she was horizontal, her body remaining impossibly rigid as it lay between the rod under her bent arm at one end, and their two pairs of hands holding her feet at the other. The Master’s eyes shone with mystical energy flowing through his being from unknown dimensions of existence. He removed one of his hands; the attendant did likewise, producing gasps of astonishment. They were supporting her now only with the fingertips of their two remaining hands, extended casually as if bearing no weight at all. Then, slowly and carefully, as if not to disrupt the delicate interplay of unseen currents, they withdrew their hands completely. Finally, the attendant who had been holding the rod at the other end let go of it and stepped back. Nyea remained hanging in the air in repose, her only contact with anything now being her upper arm on the rod. The Master snapped his fingers, and her eyes opened. She blinked several times, as if unsure for a moment where she was, then smiled, stretched her leg, and seemed to relax visibly, giving every impression of being perfectly comfortable and at ease.