The Light-Years Beneath My Feet Page 6

  It would be up to him, he realized, and his friends, to ensure that she did not suffer for making that choice. But mostly up to him.

  The group that met them in the middle of an expansive, translucent-ceilinged rotunda was undeniably impressive, standing out from the bustle of other mostly, but not exclusively, Niyyuuan travelers. There were five of the greeters. Like Viyv-pym, each was clad in a variant of the familiar kilt-skirt and upper-body wrappings. Like her, each of the greeters flashed small bits and pieces of personal adornment to which the always-overdressed Sque paid particular attention.

  Unlike the K’eremu, they carried forearm-length tubular devices that were strongly suggestive of weapons.

  Why would a greeting party sent to welcome a cook and his friends find it necessary to come armed? Walker found himself wondering. Perhaps the devices served a more ceremonial than practical purpose, and were carried more for show than out of any fear of necessity. His thoughts were drawn in that direction because each of the spiral-holstered instruments flaunted one or more types of individual decoration, from engraving that had been performed on their plasticlike bodies to distinctive touches that utilized bright metal and polished gemstone.

  None of the greeters drew his or her weapon in salute, however. The leader—a male, to judge by the color and shape of his frill—was almost stocky for a Niyyuu, though still markedly slimmer than Walker. Striding directly up to Viyv-pym, he briefly inspected each of the alien arrivals in turn before addressing their hostess. Walker’s Vilenjji implant conveyed the meaning of the escort’s speech with admirable clarity.

  “Sayings tell you hire one. I see four.”

  She extended one long, sinuous arm in the attentive human’s direction. “The one would not come without his friends.”

  “Friends?” The leader of the escort hesitated visibly. “No two is alike. All of different species.”

  “Yet friends they are,” Viyv-pym insisted. “Was only matter of additional bringing. Was ample room on ship.”

  “Perhaps is a problem of adequate room in Kojn-umm.” The escort leader made a gesture Walker did not recognize. He hoped it was more encouraging that the newcomers’ words. “Not for me to say. Not for you to say.” So not saying, he turned to face Walker and his friends directly.

  “I am Abrid-lon, scion and accountant of Kinuvu-dih-vrojj, administrator of Kojn-umm.”

  An accountant. Definitely ceremonial, Walker decided on re-viewing the weaponlike devices each member of their escort displayed.

  “Nice to meet you.” Walker thought about extending a hand, but decided to hold off. While Viyv-pym was by now familiar with the human gesture, this Niyyuu was not, and it was too soon after their arrival to chance gestures that might be misinterpreted.

  Though he wore the same type of external translator Viyv-pym employed, Abrid-lon ignored him. “This is the cook?”

  “This indeed him,” their hostess replied without hesitation.

  Dominating yellow eyes peered down at the shorter but much bulkier arrival. “I welcome you—and you’s friends. All has been made ready for you. Living quarters to match yous’ standards on Seremathenn close as possible. Working site equipped with latest utensils and tools for nonsynthesized food preparation. Kinuvu-dih-vrojj and government officials look forward to you workings.” His frill erected to maximum. “Kojn-umm renowned throughout Niyu for its respect for all arts.”

  Initially made uneasy by Viyv-pym’s unexplained nervousness, Abrid-lon’s brusque but heartfelt welcome made Walker feel much better. Behind him, he could sense his companions stirring impatiently.

  “I look forward to beginning work,” he informed the escort leader truthfully. “How far to our quarters? A time-part or so?”

  Abrid-lon gestured apologetically. “Kojn-umm large realm. Some traveling time involved, I say regrettably. With best possible traveling, arrive there late tonight.”

  Oh, well, Walker mused. He would have the opportunity to view the approach to his new home another time.

  He was left to chat with his friends as Abrid-lon engaged Viyv-pym in extended conversation. Distance rendered the Vilenjji implant inoperative, since it was dependent on his own hearing abilities to recover sufficient speech suitable for translation. As they were guided outside the port and toward a waiting transport vehicle, George inhaled deeply alongside Walker.

  “Smell that! The air here is even fresher and more oxygen-rich than Seremathenn’s. I know it’s hopefully just a temporary state of affairs, but I think I’m going to like it here. The locals may be a bit gruff, but they’re civilized and friendly enough.”

  In human and canine terms, anyway, the dog was half-right.

  The journey from the port to Kojn-umm’s center of government was accomplished by means of small individual transports that traveled above open stretches of land. These cut through fields of waving, short-stemmed corkscrew growths that terminated in flowerlike cerulean and yellow bursts of color. They were more than fungi, less than flowers. A more visually appealing route would have been difficult to imagine. Walker’s excitement at finding himself on yet another new world was muted somewhat by the knowledge that it was already late when they had touched down on the surface of Niyu, and that they would not be arriving at their new home until after dark.

  Despite the earliness of the hour when they finally reached its outskirts, Ehbahr city was still sufficiently illuminated for the newcomers to be taken aback by its modest size. It would have barely qualified as a small suburb to one of Seremathenn’s vast urban concentrations. Among the four fellow travelers, only Sque was not disappointed. The K’eremu preferred isolation and retreat to vast metropolitan concentrations, only joining together to form such when the needs of civilization and commerce demanded it. Walker, who had been expecting something like a smaller version of the great aesthetic conurbations that dominated highly developed Seremathenn, was openly disenchanted.

  “Capital Ehbahr is larger than appears, especially at night. Much our industry built underground,” Viyv-pym explained in response to their queries. “Better to preserve actual landscape for beauty, for living, for keeping of cultural history.”

  “Very admirable. We understand.” Walker looked over at his closest companion. “Don’t we, George. George?” Head on paws, the dog was sound asleep. The voyage and subsequent exhilaration attendant upon landing had thoroughly exhausted him.

  “And for war, of course,” their guide and hostess added.

  Walker blinked. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard her.” From her position hanging upside down from the roof of the transport, Sque waved a couple of tendrils. “So much for trading one ‘advanced’ culture for another. A fine choice you have made for us, human.”

  “Wait, wait.” One spoken word, assuming the Vilenjji translator had correctly conveyed its meaning, had banished all thoughts of sleep from his mind. “When I agreed to come here, Viyv-pym, you didn’t say anything about your realm being at war. Who is Kojn-umm at war with?” His hopes, so neatly aligned and optimistic, had been shattered like orange juice futures by a frost in Brazil.

  It was as if those vast, expressive, yellow and gold orbs had suddenly turned cold. “At moment, with realm of Toroud-eed. Next ten-day gathering, with somebody else. Then maybe Toroud-eed again, or possibly Sasajun-aaf. Who else would realm be at war with?” When he did not respond, she added unhelpfully, “Is nothing worry about. Is natural state of affairs.”

  A deep voice, the soul of glumness, rumbled from the back of the transport. “Here we sit, come all this way, conflict awaiting.” Given his habitual melancholy it was often difficult to tell exactly how Braouk was feeling. Not now. The Tuuqalian was as disheartened by the unexpected turn of affairs as Sque was scornful. As for George, Walker was grateful the often-acerbic George was still asleep.

  Helplessly, as they slowed and entered the city, he asked, “How can you be at war with anybody and say it’s ‘nothing worry about’? Much less say ‘is natural state of a
ffairs’?”

  “You not have ongoing or at least periodic war between individual realms where you’s home is?”

  He looked away briefly. “Yes, we have such wars, I’m sorry to say. I have been told that Braouk’s people do as well. Not Sque’s, I believe.”

  “Only occasionally on a personal level,” the K’eremu amended him helpfully. “When two individuals disagree excessively on a point of Melachian philosophy, for example, or concerning the worth of a new piece of siibalon vibrato. On such occasions, fighting usually commences with a vicious exchange of harsh language. On rare instances, blows may be thrown, perhaps even accompanied by a flung rock or two.”

  “That’s not war,” Walker muttered crossly. “That’s a domestic dispute.” He turned back to their hostess. “How long has this kind of episodic fighting been going on?” He trusted his implant to handle the translation of the relevant time frame.

  It did. Whatever else one thought about the Vilenjji, their technology was admirably reliable. “About nine thousand years,” Viyv-pym informed him without missing a beat. “Ever since Niyyuu become civilized.”

  “Not a contradiction, in war to engage, called civilization?” Braouk wondered aloud from the back of the transport.

  She turned and strained to meet his raised eyes. “On contrary, Niyyuu thoughtfully observe other sentient species and wonder how they maintain civilization without occasional internal warring.”

  Walker’s head began to throb as he tried to make sense of what he was being told. The Niyyuuan’s warped logic was occasioning him more pain than the occasional jolt in their ride. “You say sporadic warfare helps you to maintain your civilization, but that it’s nothing to worry about. There’s a clash of reasoning there I just don’t understand. I don’t understand it at all.”

  “You will,” she assured him confidently. “You not only do peformancing for Administrator Kinuvu-dih-vrojj and government, you also prepare food for Saluu-hir-lek and his staff.”

  He frowned. The first name he recognized, but this was the first time that the second one had been made known to him. “I signed on to cook for whoever you wish, but who is Saluu-hir-lek?”

  “Commanding general,” Abrid-lon called back to him from the front of the transport, “and lord high protector of the conjoined territories of Kojn-umm. Very pleasant person. You will like him.”

  Curioser and curioser. He was drowning in incomprehension. “I thought Kinuvu-dih-vrojj was the leader of Kojn-umm?”

  Viyv-pym exhaled softly in his direction. Her breath washed over him like essence of roses. “Kinuvu-dih-vrojj, she head of government. Saluu-hir-lek, he head of traditional military. One not superior to another. Just different work taxonomy. I procurer. You exotic food preparation demonstrator. You’s friends—they receive appropriate classifications in due time.” A long, willowy arm reached out toward him.

  “You tired, Marc. Long journeying from Seremathenn. Relax, not worry. Kojn-umm pleasant place. Ehbahr city and citizens enlightened, congenial. You will like it here.”

  Apprehensive and anxious, he slumped back in his seat. “I’m sure I will—unless you lose this war and are overrun by your enemies.”

  Her painted circlet of a mouth expanded in amusement as she coughed twice. “Perhaps lose. Have lost before. Is no realm that has not. Could not manage world society otherwise. But Kojn-umm not be ‘overrun,’ in sense you suggest. Cannot happen.”

  “Why not?” he asked straightforwardly, without wondering if the question might be viewed by his hosts as tactless.

  “Because would not be civilized thing to do. You think Niyyuu barbarians? Not as advanced as Sessrimathe, maybe, but plenty civilized and refined are my kind. You will see. Maybe even,” she finished considerately, “you like try you’s hand at fighting, too, someday.”

  Walker was quietly aghast. “I agreed to come here to create cuisine, not to kill!”

  She gestured placatingly. “Is your choice. Did not mean upset you. Is not necessary participate. Very much competition for spaces in traditional military, anyway.”

  He sat stunned and silent, unable to believe what he was hearing. It was so at odds with everything he had come to believe about the Niyyuu. Or, he told himself, was it only what he had wanted to believe about the Niyyuu? Had he settled hopes and expectations on Viyv-pym and her people that were grounded only in wishful thinking?

  “Have you fought in this war, in the military?” he finally heard himself asking.

  “Oh, most for sure.” The eagerness in her voice could not be denied. “Was fortunate enough be awarded two whole full enlistment periods.”

  “And . . . you killed?”

  “Of course.” Golden eyes glittered with recollection as her voice quivered with suggestions of thrills remembered. “Not real war without killing.”

  How could he argue with that? he told himself. For the first time since he had met her, the beauteous and exotic Viyv-pym receded once again into the realm of the utterly alien.

  As was often the case, it was left to Sque to emotionlessly evaluate what they had been told. “There are ramifications here we do not understand,” she declared quietly from her hanging place in the center of the swaying transport’s ceiling. “We must work to acquire the obligatory cultural referents before we can pronounce judgment. Operating in ignorance, we cannot hope to properly assess composite indigenous conditions.”

  Walker latched onto her uncertainty like an overextended client to a fresh line of credit. What the K’eremu was saying was that there was more here than met the eye, or the ear. Though for the life of him he could not fathom what that might be, he was willing to give it time in the hope that a sensible explanation would present itself.

  Traversing parsecs to swap their situation on peaceful, accommodating Seremathenn for a millennia-old ongoing war was not what he’d had in mind when he had signed on hoping to improve their chances of getting home.

  Often dimly illuminated, the buildings they passed differed in design, shape, and size from those on Seremathenn. Such was to be expected, since Viyv-pym had informed them that much of Niyu’s commerce took place belowground. There was certainly enough nocturnal illumination, however, to guide incoming hostile aircraft, much less anything more sophisticated. Therefore it was abundantly clear the people of Ehbahr city did not fear an assault from the air. That suggested several possibilities, none of which made any more sense to him than what he had already been told. He gave up trying to figure out what was going on and determined to wait for an explanation that did. Hopefully, one would be provided to them.

  There was certainly nothing wrong with or Spartan about their quarters. Prepared in advance according to specifications supplied by Viyv-pym, they bordered on the luxurious. Having been provided with particulars by its new employees, the government of Kojn-umm had gone out of its way to make them feel at home.

  Walker’s personal space on Seremathenn had been accommodating. His quarters in a luxurious section of Ehbahr city consisted of separate, spacious rooms for sitting, sleeping, receiving guests, and performing personal ablutions. Instead of a view of other transformed buildings such as he’d had on Seremathenn, he had transparent barriers that opaqued or vanished at the wave of a hand to allow egress to a porch that overlooked a small stream running through carefully maintained Niyuan forest.

  Flashing multihued phosphorescent scales, small creatures of the night scampered to and fro between foliage and stream. Since the connected rooms did not boast the responsive, all-pervasive synthesized voice-response system of an advanced Seremathenn dwelling, he was shown how to request service from a live Niyyuuan attendant. George would share quarters with Walker, they were informed, while on casual inspection the easygoing Braouk found his private accommodations to be more than satisfactory. Upon being shown her own lodgings, which included a section of the nearby creek to provide constant moisture, even Sque had less than the normal number of complaints.

  Promising to meet with them again in the
morning, both Viyv-pym and Abrid-lon left the newest employees of the government of Kojn-umm to their own devices. Toying with the receiving room’s entertainment/information system, Walker found it to be as highly developed as anything he had used on Seremathenn. Neither it, nor the peacefully sleeping city, nor the attitude of the individual Niyyuu he had encountered since arriving squared with the reality of continual, ongoing combat. For about five minutes, he worried about being killed in his sleep on the special resting platform that had been provided for him. Then another kind of reality took over, and he fell into a deep and untroubled sleep.

  5

  Walker sat up sharply in the approximation of a bed, awakened by something that sounded like forty chickens being simultaneously strangled. Looking around wildly for the source of the horrible screeching, he searched the entire room twice before he realized it was only the Niyyuuan equivalent of a gentle, mellifluous, preprogrammed wake-up song.

  Have to have that recording changed, he told himself shakily as he descended from the sleeping platform to manually cancel the persistent wail. No doubt more than a few of the provisions that had been made for his life here would require comparable modifications.

  Passing by one of the darkened view-walls, he directed it to vanish. The energizing tingle of fresh air filled the room, accompanied by a flush of bright sunshine. Walking out onto the small porch, he found himself gazing across the nearby stream that had been only a dark sliver muttering to itself during the night. A quintet of humming furballs he did not yet have a name for bobbed past, seeking surcease, shade, and nectar. Rustlings in the underbrush on the other side of the brook hinted at the presence within of alien ground dwellers. The noises did not concern him. If any danger existed from native animals, he was certain he would have been informed.