The line to the central gateway was a long one, and it moved slowly. The central gateway was more often known simply as the Gateway. It was highly ornamented, as old as anything or older in this city barren of ornaments. The path that led to it from the outer edge of the plaza sloped gently downward until it met the thick wood and metal doors inset into the archway. Stringer glanced at the motto cut into the stone above his head: You who are entering, don’t be sad; you who are leaving, don’t rejoice. The motto struck a familiar ring to Stringer, and he decided that it was more appropriate here than on Two-Bit.
He stood there with an unlit candle hidden beneath his cloak to protect it from the fierce winds and cold rain that lashed about him in all directions. Already a number of houses had collapsed, and netting blew across the ground. High above his head thunder rolled through the air, crossing the sky from horizon to far horizon, metallic-sounding, as if enclosed in a giant pipe. The sky was black and gray; snow would be coming soon, but they would be Under before then. Lightning streaked the sky with the thunder. Lightning at this time of year? It made little sense to Stringer, but then it made little sense to call a Bannk a year. Ta-tjenen shook a moment later from a new barrage of heaven-rumbling.
The checkpoint moved closer all the time, step by step, monotonically toward the Patra. Suddenly four figures emerged, traveling in the opposite direction from the crowd. One tugged violently, but his three guards overpowered him and kept him moving.
Stringer nudged the person ahead of him in line. Who’s that? What’s going on?
Stringer wondered if the woman who answered him knew who had questioned
her. He is a Gostum spy. He was seen
consorting with the missing Gostum during the Festival and is being
exposed.
What? I never heard about that. No one—
Stringer.
The soft voice behind him was
Taljen’s.
What?
Stringer said, looking over his shoulder
at the man being carried away. He hadn’t spoken to Taljen since the
Parlztluzan, several beclads ago.
Have you decided where you are staying?
With Alhane.
The man was nearly across the
plaza now, still struggling.
We can live together if you wish. That is usually
done between nestas.
The prisoner collapsed, and Stringer saw him being dragged away,
unconscious, beyond the now fully closed pod-trees in the park. So that is what you had in mind for me. You’re just
going to let him die out there. If not me, you need another victim. Do you
sacrifice an unwitting stooge to every Patra? A Gostum spy! That is the
feeblest excuse for an execution I’ve ever heard of.
Stringer was at the Gateway now. Alhane, the Time Keeper, as was his duty, lit Stringer’s candle. Stringer looked down the passageway and saw many flickering candles dotting the darkness.
Name?
The checker looked up. Never mind.
It was Benjfold, who quickly turned
back to the list.
Yes, I’m sure you haven’t forgotten.
Stringer…
Taljen said.
I’ll think about it.
I can’t find anything wrong,
Stringer said
after he had finished checking the entire passageway. The trouble must be Above.
After all the work we did!
Alhane sighed,
glancing down at the dead tank. I ask you, is that a
just reward?
What did you expect for a first try? We didn’t
have much time and there were bound to be problems. I say we go up. I
remember which windmill I connected these to.
Alhane hesitated. This is probably the worst time to
go up, between Bannk and Patra. You may never come back.
Do you want light?
Alhane nodded.
They found their way up to the top level and to the Gateway room and began to put on thick graskhide parks and boots. Then Alhane got a rope and hooked Stringer and himself together. The inner doors slid open easily, but the outer one was stuck. After Stringer kicked it several times, the door jarred loose and they pulled it open. A gust of wind almost took Stringer off his feet, and the snow that blew in almost blinded him. They forced their way out and were buffeted about by hurricane-strength winds carrying stinging snow. Alhane’s lamp blew out immediately, but Stringer had brought his own lantern, which was not the type that would blow out.
And we’ve only been Under four beclads!
Stringer shouted.
Alhane didn’t hear him. A giant thunderclap shook the plaza and they fell to the ground. Stringer stood up shakily to see, dimly, half the roof of the giant meeting tent being torn away and smashed onto the plaza. Drifts of snow lapped around the pillars that had once held a solid roof. Another bolt of lightning and thunder followed at an imperceptible delay, and Stringer, struggling to his feet again, saw one of the pod-trees in the park collapse. Now the lightning flashed continuously, so fast that Alhane and he moved in stroboscopic motion. Stringer did not think he had ever been so frightened.
He pulled the rope and tugged Alhane to his feet. They trudged slowly
toward the windmill they were seeking. The passed several empty houses,
most of which had large gashes torn into their sides. The nets that held
them creaked with the strain, and the ropes were frayed, ready to give way
soon. As they continued down the street, following the guy lines that
crisscrossed Ta-tjenen, Stringer suddenly shouted to Alhane, Duck!
He yanked the older man down just as an
entire house was ripped from its foundations and sailed by them into
another dwelling, which crumbled under the impact. They reached the
windmill after a telclad of struggling and found its blades spinning so
fast that Stringer expected it to fly away. As he was walking up to it, he
thought he heard a voice.
Was that you, Alhane?
he shouted, trying to
carry his voice above the wind.
No, what?
Listen!
Help me!
The cry was faint.
Stringer peered into the nearest house whose door had been torn off. Snow
was piling on the inside, where a vague figure clothed in graskhide was
slumped on the floor. The exile!
Stringer
unclasped the rope that tied him to Alhane and ran into the house. His
lantern dispersed the shadows and illuminated the scene. The man was still
alive, but by how much Stringer couldn’t tell. He bent down to the
curled-up figure. Can you walk if I help you?
The man nodded, but Stringer didn’t believe him. He put his arms under the
exile’s shoulders and pulled him to his feet.
What are you doing?
cried Alhane, who had
climbed into the house. You can’t help him. He is in
exile.
Do you expect me to leave him here?
You can’t take him Under. All of us would be thrown
out for sure.
Then I won’t take him Under.
What can you do? It is against all the rules.
You are a hateful people who claim you don’t know
what it means not to cooperate. Well, that obviously applies only to the
straight and narrow. Now, if you don’t get out of my way, I’ll knock you
out of that door and you won’t get back up again!
Alhane backed away, speechless.
Wait in here. I’ll be back as soon as I can.
Stringer hobbled by, the exile’s heavy body leaning against his own. After being blown off the citadel stairs more than once and climbing over more than a few felled trees, they finally reached Number One.
Stringer took the prisoner through the cockpit into the main section of the
shuttle, the cargo and passenger area. Look, do
you understand me?
The man nodded.
I don’t have time to show you how everything
works.
He opened a storage bin and removed some food. Here is the food. You open it like this—are you
listening?
Stringer slapped the man on the face and he nodded
again. Stringer walked over to the cabin controls. Look, I don’t know if there is enough fuel left to
keep the cabin warm throughout the Patra. Keep the temperature as low as
you can to conserve fuel. Do it with this, see? The toilet is back
there. Figure it out yourself. This tent here,
he said, unfurling the
aluminized plastic, is an excellent
insulator. Sleep in it if you have to. The cabin won’t freeze unless the
fuel runs out or you do something stupid, like open a door. See these jugs?
Water. Melt snow if they run out, which means you will have to open a
door. Then make sure this one is closed before you open the outer one. Do
you understand?
Stringer shoved some food into the exile’s mouth. You’d better understand. Good luck, exile, to both of
us.
Alhane was still waiting in the abandoned house when Stringer returned. They did not speak. Stringer climbed up the scaffolding and saw that the generator box had been improperly closed. He spent a few minutes with a hammer and chisel, unjamming the ice that had frozen the rotor fast. Then he climbed down, job completed.
On their way back to the Gateway, Stringer looked eastward into the darkening sky painted with lightning and thunder. He could not see the sun; he did not even known if it had set yet. But he was sure the Patra had finally arrived.
The room was small, with no more than a wooden partition separating it from the next dwelling. It was crammed with the only bed in Ta-tjenen, a desk, and two chairs, one of which always managed to wedge itself between table and bed. Stringer tried to ignore the ceaseless conversation going on in the next room, revolving around that favorite Tjenen topic of discussion, the makeup of the current nestrexas. Was that Taljen’s name mentioned for the dozenth time? Stringer shivered. Fuel rations were being reduced. He brought his attention back to Alhane, who was studying a large piece of parchment that was spread across the table. His skin looked colorless in the queer light from the glowing tank.
Stringer thought he had waited the appropriate pause, and now he leaned
toward the Time Keeper and said, …and have
you ever considered going south?
Alhane sighed. Many times. Patra-Bannk seems to be
larger than I expected, and I imagine there is much to see.…But I’m getting
too old for that sort of trip, I’ll have to be truthful on that
account. Still, you must take someone.
I need all the glide ratio I can get. That may be
the crucial factor on this trip. And there’s no one here for whom it’s
worth sacrificing those extra kilometers except you—
Impetuous Stringer!
Otherwise it’s me, my tent, and my rodoft—
Take Taljen,
Alhane said bluntly.
Stringer curled his lip under his teeth and stood up. He wandered into
Alhane’s second room, a privilege that only Alhane, as Time Keeper, and a
few others were allowed. In it Alhane’s clocks were buzzing and grinding
away, whirring and clacking. Taljen and I haven’t
spoken in…in who knows how long?
Stringer stopped and looked about. None of your clocks seem to agree with any of the
others, and there doesn’t seem to be any other way of finding out. Who
knows how long we’ve been cooped up here? You might as well take my watch
for all the good it will do you. At least it runs constantly.
He pulled
his watch off his belt and threw it on the table in front of the Time
Keeper’s eyes.
The silver-haired man picked the thing up and scrutinized it carefully,
How do you know that Taljen would even want to
come?
Stringer asked, picking up his monologue.
I don’t know that she would. Certainly no one else
would risk it—
—but the Time Keeper.
Alhane craned his head up at Stringer. Do you think
we would get along well enough together? I thought you would kill me that
time we went Above.
I think you’re the only person I could get along
with. No one else seems to want to have anything to do with me. I eat
alone, sleep alone, work—
That’s mostly your own fault. Also, you have no
nestrexa of your own, so you are not accepted.
Stringer wrinkled his nose. You have no nestrexa,
either, from what I’ve heard.
I never claimed that the Tjenens are totally happy
with me, either, I’ll not lie about that. To them—well, I have to say it,
they think me a little odd. After all, they’re right—and they always are. I
grew up with a crazy father until he died and a crazy mother, too, for much
longer, while, at the very least, any of them have had at least eight of
each, sometimes more, occasionally less. So I am unusual in that sense.
And brothers and sister?
Many, very many. Too many to bother indexing.
Wives? Or nestas?
I alone had one only.
Where is she? You never speak of her.
Alhane looked at the floor. I’m afraid she died last
Patra. Sickness.
I’m sorry,
Stringer said.
Not as much as I. I miss her a great deal
sometimes. It is difficult to be a Time Keeper; you miss your nestas when
they have gone.
Why is it that only the Time Keeper has a
permanent family?
Alhane shrugged. A total fluke, if the story is
correct. After the revolt—well, after the revolt there was a long period of
which we have only infrequent records. Sometime after that, or during—so
the story goes, mind you—Ta-tjenen decided that it needed a Time Keeper. No
one wanted to do it, so the post was decided by the outcome of a game of
drisbit. You may have seen it being played on occasion—
That’s the game with the bones and the thread?
Alhane nodded.
But it’s totally random—
Exactly. So the winner—or loser, depending on your
point of view—became Time Keeper. The next time around the Time Keeper was
chosen the same way, and, by coincidence, it turned out to be the previous
one’s eldest daughter. On the third round, and I’ll not tell you falsely
here, the results were even more miraculous: the daughter’s natural son was
chosen. The Tjenens, wisely deciding that the gods were trying to tell them
something, made the Time Keeper’s position hereditary.
So you must have a child.
A son and a daughter. I train both, as is my
duty. They do their best to make me out a fool. One or the other of them
will make a better Time Keeper than I.
Alhane chuckled at this.
Then why don’t I see them?
They are old enough—and glad enough, mind you—to be
on their own, almost your age. You may run into them occasionally at our
seminars. But they like their freedom for the short while they have it
left. Soon, after I retire, one of them will take over.
Good. Then we will build the glider for the two of
us.
Alhane sighed and nodded his head.
Patra-Bannk continued on its slow course around the sun and, almost as slowly, continued to rotate about its own axis. The winds calmed somewhat and became colder as heat radiated into space while the city of Ta-tjenen crawled away from the terminator into the Patra.
The Tjenens’ own internal time keepers continued to shift until, after less than a teclad, most of the population had changed sleeping sections. Now the effect that Stringer had noticed on a smaller scale Above was highly visible: he could never understand why Taljen and the others, according to his watch, never slept on the same schedule for many beclads. With so few externalities to tell them when to rise and when to sleep, the Tjenens’ circadian cycle floated as it pleased, never remaining in phase with the ticking of Alhane’s nonconstant clocks. Skin color, too, had radically altered, not just paled, but changed by many shades to a light tan.
Stringer and Alhane had just finished the last details of the sailplane design when the tank in the Time Keeper’s room flickered and died.
Ah, Lashgar, where are you?
Alhane cried in the
dark. He rose, tripped over a chair, and finally managed to find his
tinderbox. He lit a candle and placed it inside the enclosure that guided
its fumes to the ventilating shafts. Gone,
he
sighed over the tanks, and we dare not go outside to
fix it, be the machine frozen or collapsed in the winds.
Cheer up. What did you expect for a first try? And
so far, all the others are working. Maybe we can tie into the other
wires—
And when the other windmills go?
We’ll worry about that when the time comes.
Alhane shook his head. That is not the way to
survive on Patra-Bannk, Stringer. Remember that, because you’ll have
to.
I’ll remember. Now show me where you stored the
materials.
It would be wise to take a cloak; it will be
chilly.
Alhane pulled his graskhide from under the bed. Throwing it
over his back, he set down the adjoining corridor. He carried a small
lantern because the lights had gone out in this section. Alhane moved with
such assurance that Stringer was certain he could have found the way even
if blind. He navigated corners with small shuffly steps, cut across
communal rooms, ducked under low beams that always caught Stringer’s
forehead, and climbed down precariously balanced ladders. They descended
two levels or three, until it was dark again and cold as well. The oldest part of Ta-tjenen,
Alhane said. He
finally opened an ancient door that was, surprisingly, made of metal,
rusted now after belbannks.
Alhane stopped by the entrance to pick up a torch that was leaning against the wall and lit it with his lantern. Oily black smoke rose to the ceiling; Alhane coughed and quickly disappeared through the door. Stringer watched the flame trace the circumference of the room, leaving other torches flaring in its wake. Stringer began to realize how big the room was in which he was standing—and also what sat in the center.
With his arms clasped around his chest to keep warm, Stringer walked to the
middle of the floor. Why didn’t you tell me this
before?
And when has there been time for that?
Stringer ran his hand over the hull of a ship that looked not unlike that of Number One. The nose was more sharply pointed, the engines were mounted differently, and the aft flared a bit.
Polkraitz?
Yes,
Alhane called out as he went from one torch
to another, checking to make sure the fumes were being carried away by
their ventilating hoods. They’ve been sitting here
since the first Golun, when the Polkraitz left.
A funny thing to leave behind.
Stringer
cleared away some dust from the hull with his finger and found a
designation. I’ll be this is an ancestor of your
own alphabet,
he remarked, studying the characters. Why didn’t they come back to get them? They said they
would—
—and this is the Golun-Patra.
Alhane chuckled;
Stringer glared. I don’t know,
the Time Keeper
went on. Sometimes I wonder if the Polkraitz were
the mighty rulers or enemies, as the Tjenens would like to believe.
So do I. The stories Taljen told me just don’t
hang together. I can’t say why exactly, they just don’t.
All this time
Stringer had been tugging away at the hatch, which finally gave way. A
cabin light went on as he put his foot in but faded quickly until it was
dark once more. He grabbed a torch and brought it inside the ship. The
controls were built for a humanoid; the labels were in a language
resembling the Tjenen, which must have meant that the Tjenens were direct
descendants of the Polkraitz. After a few moments of trying buttons and
switches at random, during which time a few lights blinked and faded and a
display screen flashed, then disappeared, it was clear that the ship was as
dead as Stringer’s own.
Now, Disillusioned Stringer, you can guess why I did
not mention it to you for so long. We have known about these for ages.
I didn’t expect much,
Stringer replied,
closing the hatch behind him. He saw then, as he stepped down, that he was
facing a wall of shelves heaped with metal and old, battered pieces of
equipment. The Junk?
A good guess indeed. Left over with the ships by the
Polkraitz. There’s lots of it. We should be able to find useful parts here,
control wire, for instance. My motto is: never throw out anything, even
Junk. And I think there is quite enough room here to build a sailplane—
And a good place to freeze to death,
Stringer
said, watching his breath emerge from his mouth in distended puffs.
Would you rather build it Above?
Maybe we should. You realize you’ve never told me
how cold it actually gets out there. It may be a hoax for all I know.
If you’d like to be quick-frozen, I can let you see
for yourself. But as to how cold it gets, I should say I’m not sure. I
never go Above myself during the Patra except at dawn, as I’ve
mentioned. Indeed, to ponder it, dawn may be colder than midpatra, since by
then it’s been dark for so long that the air has had a longer time to
clothe itself in night and cool off. But I should say again that I’m not
sure. Once I left out a thermometer I had made during the Bannk that I
could read from below, and it had no more sense than to crack. Then I built
another, using a different liquid, and that coward retreated off the bottom
of the scale, frozen solid. Then I tried another thermometer, using a
gas. That was tricky, and my results aren’t to be trusted—
What were they?
Below minus one hundred degrees centigrade. So, my
Freezing Stringer, things aren’t so bad under here.
Sarek! It’s positively boiling in this room! I’ll
be stripping down soon!
And with that, Stringer got to work.