Authors: L.E. Modesitt Jr.
Tags: #Science Fiction, #Science Fiction & Fantasy
Timegods' World
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For Wendy, Margot, and Mimi
Just because,
although each of you knows why.
THINK OF A world of witches, of high technology and space travel, of science and superstition. A world on the verge of changing inhabitable planets into green pastures and endless forests, a world so short of energy resources that all fuels are grown or captured from the sun.
You say there is no such world? Or that it is only our world, dressed up for a storyteller’s pleasure?
Set aside your doubts … this world was as real as any you will know … and learn about the timedivers’ dawn. Perhaps it began here:
“MERYN.” THE SLIGHT, sandy-haired woman looked as though she carried perhaps a score of years, until she gazed upon one, and the darkness behind her eyes delivered the weight of centuries.
“Yes, Mother.” The second woman, also slender and sandy-haired, could have been a twin to the first, except for the lesser depth of her eyes.
“It’s time.”
“I know.”
“There can be no more witches in Eastron. Not now. Not with the empress of Westron’s demands, and the weaknesses in the Duchy.”
“But the Bardwalls still stand … .”
“And they will, and you may always return to look upon them. You must make a place among the people of Westron and learn their technologies. Our time has gone and will not come again for centuries. Not until they have stripped the last metals from the ground. Not until they have been hurled from the skies.”
“Mother?”
“Yes.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“Daughter, I know that Eastron is dying, and all the villagers and all the gentry will blame it on the witches. Because of the duke our faces are too well known. So I will face the empress with him, come what may, and you will survive.”
“Mother!”
There is no answer, for the older witch has vanished.
The younger woman looked around the retreat, then continued placing her few things in the pack, which will be all that she can carry on her instant yet long journey.
IT SEEMS SO simple. It is not. It could have begun here as well:
“WITCH! WITCH!”
Thud! Crack!
One rock, then another, struck the whitewashed wall.
Their target, a stocky boy-child with strawberry blond hair, a dazed expression, and shoulders already overbroad, looked down from the low wall where he balanced. Looked down at the whitewashed surface where the rocks had struck near his feet, then back at the gathered handful of women, crippled veterans, and the priest.
“ … like his mother …”
“ … dead … thank Verlyt … !”
Crack! Whmmmpt!
“Suffer not a witch, nor a witch’s child …”
The boy looked from one face to another, back and forth, as if seeking reassurance.
Crack!
One of the rocks struck his shoulder, hard enough to stagger him.
“Witch! Witch! Witch!” The chant began in earnest, echoing between the walls, drowning out the occasional low rumble of dry cloud thunder. Thunder that promised nothing but clouds that delivered no rain, no respite.
“Witch! Witch! Witch … !”
Crack!
Suddenly, the boy’s dazed expression vanished and his face screwed up, as if he were about to cry. In a single motion, he tightened his lips and jumped down on the far side of the wall, away from the crowd, and began to run.
Pad, pad, pad, pad … !
The alleyway remained silent for an instant, the villagers momentarily silenced.
The alleyway remained silent for an instant, the villagers momentarily silenced.
“Witch! Witch! Witch … !” The chant took on an even more frantic note.
Some of the veterans dragged themselves over the wall and hobbled or ran, knives in the hands of those who still had hands, after the fleeing child. Others turned back into the main street and dashed around toward the other end of the alley into which the child had fled.
“Witch! Witch! Witch … !”
Thud! Thud, thuuddd, thhuuddd . .
. The heavy roll of the priests’ drums supplemented the chant.
. The heavy roll of the priests’ drums supplemented the chant.
From huts and houses, from the vintners and the villas, the pursuers gathered, pounding down street and alley, tearing through house and hovel.
“There he is!”
“ … witch-child … !”
“SUFFER NOT A WITCH TO LIVE, NOR A WITCH’S CHILD!” boomed the amplified voice of the priest.
The boy, backed into a narrow niche between two walls behind the produce market, held a rock in each hand, waiting.
Crack!
The first rock from a villager slapped against the wall.
The first rock from a villager slapped against the wall.
Crack! Thud! Crack! Thud!
The past experience of the rock throwers showed as stone after stone bounced against and around the boy.
The past experience of the rock throwers showed as stone after stone bounced against and around the boy.
He threw one stone back. It missed. He threw the other.
“Devil! Witch-child!”
Overhead, the dry thunder rumbled, and the dry clouds churned.
A rivulet of blood dribbled down the boy’s face, no longer expressionless, but filled with rage, even as the tears diluted his blood into pinkish streaks.
Crack! Thud! Thud!
“Gone!”
“ … damned witches … ! reclaimed their own …”
The small niche in the walls was empty, vacant but for rocks and streaks of blood upon the walls.
“ … YOU HAVE RECLAIMED YOUR BIRTHRIGHT FROM THE WITCHES THIS DAY …” bellowed the amplifier.
A third of a world away, two soldiers paused by the roadside to investigate a heap of clothing.
“Kid … been beaten …”
“Forcer!”
“Frillen, now what? Another discarded sack that has to be an aggre-bel?” The heavy-set and silver-haired forcer glared at the two as he spoke.
The trooper pointed. “Kid. Beaten. He’s still breathing.”
“He’ll live. Put him in the rear freighter with Garchuk. He looks strong. The ConFed home will take him. Now, let’s get moving.”
The two troopers shrugged. One lifted the boy and marched toward the military freight steamer. The other followed the ConFed forcer.
“ … AND NOW, IN the presence of the unknowable and the almighty, we wish you the greatest success in your striving to bring us all another world for all people, in peace, for our successors and their successors …”
The face of the gray-haired and young-faced Emperor of Westron
faded from the solideo link, to be replaced by the coat of arms of the Hrtallen.
faded from the solideo link, to be replaced by the coat of arms of the Hrtallen.
“Rather impressive,” observed the stocky man, his red hair somehow bushy in spite of its close-cropped nature.
“Isn’t that the nature of royalty? To be impressive, I mean?” Her voice held an edge.
“That doesn’t make young Hrtallen any less impressive. Besides, getting his formal support for the Mithrada planetforming can’t hurt once the initial enthusiasm dies down.”
“Assuming he isn’t the politician his mother was.”
“Lorinda.”
“I know. It had to be done. The Eastron anarchy was a danger to everyone, but did they have to be so damned thorough? All the time that white-haired and sweet-faced old harpy was displaying motherly concern, her peacemakers were rooting out anyone who could pronounce the word anarchy.”
The Imperial coat of arms faded from the screen, to be replaced in turn by an official Imperial newscaster in the traditional blue and gold. “That was the sendoff speech of the emperor, dedicating the unified Queryan mission designed to turn Mithrada into the second habitable planet within our solar system.”
The view switched to an ancient circular brownstone tower, flying two banners, one the Westron flag, and the second bearing a sheaf of grain crossed with a single red flower—a ryall.
“But there are those who doubt the practicality and wisdom of tampering with the Mithradan ecosphere, such as it is. One of the doubters, here at the University of Vrecallitt, is Academician Terril Josset …”
“Turn it off, Harlon,” snapped Lorinda. “One thing worse than a sincere emperor is an insincere and misguided academic.”
The screen returned to a view of the stars before the
Hope,
as it edged inward toward the orbit of the sun’s second planet, toward its mission to reform and cool the blistering wastes of Mithrada. To strip the heavy atmosphere and rebuild the planet in the image desired by men and women. To mine the only concentrations of metals within even impractical possibility, now that the thin outer asteroid belts had been stripped of what could be found.
Hope,
as it edged inward toward the orbit of the sun’s second planet, toward its mission to reform and cool the blistering wastes of Mithrada. To strip the heavy atmosphere and rebuild the planet in the image desired by men and women. To mine the only concentrations of metals within even impractical possibility, now that the thin outer asteroid belts had been stripped of what could be found.
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