Grass

  The doctor gave her a strange look and peered into her eyes. Marjorie nodded. "They're always telling us what God has said in books. All my life I've had God's word in my pocket, and here He wrote it all somewhere else … "

  "Shhh," said Dr. Bergrem, patting her on the arm. Marjorie relaxed and let it go. After a time the doctor went away, and there was nothing to listen to but her own breathing and the machines' humming. She thought of Dr. Bergrem's book. She thought about intelligence. She thought about Stella. Faintly she remembered the face of God, and almost as though she had read it in a fairy tale long ago, how Father Sandoval looked with dragonfly wings.

  In the crowded room where Rigo sat, Brother Mainoa was being wearily firm, drawing on the last of his strength to insist upon action. "The tunnel has to be closed," he said. "At once. It's available as a way for the Hippae to invade Commons. We heard them behind us when we came in, no great numbers because the tunnel is too small for them to come through except one at a time, but still a few of them are enough to do great damage."

  "Some of them came in behind you," said Alverd Bee, the mayor. "The minute you arrived and told us there was a way through, I sent two men to keep watch, and they report a handful of the beasts at the tunnel entrance."

  "A dozen now could be a hundred by nightfall," Rigo said. "Brother Mainoa is right. That tunnel has to be destroyed."

  "I wish I had some idea how to go about that," the mayor said, turning to his father-in-law. "Roald? Do you have any ideas?"

  Roald fidgeted. "Alive, what the hell can you try? Blow it up with something. Flood it somehow. Get some kind of gate across it." He rubbed his head. "Hime Pollut is good at this kind of thing. Ask him."

  Alverd went to find Hime Pollut. In a few moments he returned "Hime thinks we ought to blow it up. He just doesn't know what we've got that'll do the job."

  Rigo said, "Don't you have construction explosives, things you use to loosen up the rock when you have to expand the winter quarters? Or in mines? You have mines. Use that!"

  "We've thought of that, Ambassador, but there are Hippae massed at this end of the tunnel. There's no way we can get in there close to blow it up without getting eaten first." Alverd chewed his lips, thinking.

  "The other end – "

  "The same, Ambassador. Hippae. at both ends. As soon as I heard about the ones at this end, I sent an aircar to see what was happening at the other end. The driver counted about a hundred of the beasts out in the grasses, with about a score or so guarding the tunnel entrance. Assuming they stay that way, still we've no way to get to the tunnel."

  "Drop something from above?"

  "What? We have a few explosives but no bombs. No – what do you call them – detonators. There are people here who could build bombs, if we had the materials, or make the materials, possibly, if we had the time. You and your friend here say there may not be time. If we could get into the swamp forest far enough, if we could locate the tunnel from above, and if we had days or weeks to work, we could drill into it and flood it. We don't have days or weeks. We have hours. Maybe. They've laid their plans. Your wife found their declaration of war trampled into that cavern. We've seen it. Brother Mainoa here has told us what it means. That word says they plan to come in here and slaughter us all, just as the Arbai were slaughtered. Fun and games for the Hippae, they say."

  "Where does the tunnel come to the surface?" Rigo asked.

  Brother Mainoa said, "On a little island among the trees at the bottom of this slope. The forest is narrowest here, on the east side of the port. Two or three Terran miles through, perhaps. Elsewhere it's wider, but on this side the land slopes up on either side of the swamp and narrows it to a neck. There's where the damned migerers dug. That's where they must have been digging for years. The tunnel has to go deep enough to have a good rock layer above or it'd be full of water. Who knows how long it's taken them!"

  "Can you reach the entrance to the tunnel? Can you physically get to it?" Rigo asked Alverd Bee.

  "We could if the Hippae weren't there, yes. But not with them there. Not with them rampaging around, coming after us," Alverd ran his fingers through his hair, pulled his lips back to reveal his teeth, furrowed his brow. "We don't have any armor, any kind of combat vehicle. The little runners we use around town, they're like pea pods. We could use aircars to drive them back inside the tunnel, just inside, but then they'd come out again when any one of us tried to lay explosives."

  "If we enticed them away, you could go in close and blow up the entrance, block it."

  "Entice them away how?" Alverd turned to regard Rigo with an expression of half hope, half suspicion.

  "I don't know yet. Could you do it?"

  "Maybe. Probably."

  "Then get ready to do it."

  "God, it seems pretty hopeless." Alverd shook his head.

  Rigo glared up at him. "Those of us here on Grass may end up being the last of humanity, Mayor Bee. Assume that we are. How would you prefer to die? Waiting or fighting?"

  Alverd showed his teeth again and went away. Rigo turned to Roald Few. "If we entice the creatures out, some of them may go around us. Can you get everyone down into the winter quarters and barricade the entrances? Can you arm people? If you have nothing else, arm them with laser knives, the kind Persun gave me."

  "People can be armed, yes. But I think we have a line of defense to use before we're forced into winter quarters, Ambassador. We have the barrier at Gom. Let's put weapons there, first. Weapons and some courageous people."

  "That could work. Get everyone behind that line. Evacuate the Commercial District and Portside. Get everyone into the winter quarters except those who are going to fight. Be sure the ships in port are shut up tight- !f we get out of this, we may need them later. Where's your power station?"

  "Below the town, in winter quarters. They'll have to get us first before they can get the power station."

  And likely to do so, Rigo thought. Likely to do so. After a few moments of silence passed, Roald left him to his thoughts, which were all of death and destruction. It was easy to speak of enticement. Less easy to think of a way to do it. He went to the window and leaned in it, not seeing the bustle and confusion outside, not seeing anything but his own bloody images. "Ambassador?"

  "Yes, Sebastian."

  "There's a Green Brother here to see you. The high mucky-muck. Head of that whole bunch."

  "What's his name?"

  "Jhamlees Zoe. Says he has to talk with you."

  "I can spare him about three minutes."

  "I told him you were all busy. Told him what about, too. There's a room over there with nobody in it. I'll bring him there."

  The Elder Brother was peremptory. "Ambassador, I need to know what you know about the plague." Though the room was chilly, sweat stood at the roots of his hair and ran down behind his ears.

  "Indeed," said Rigo. "On what authority?" He stared at the odd face before him.

  "Sanctity's authority. They sent you. They told me to keep in touch."

  "I wasn't given that information. I was told no one on Grass was to know anything about my mission here " Rigo watched a drop of sweat roll down the man's tiny nose and hang at the tip.

  "I received word from the new Hierarch, Cory Strange. His message came on the same ship that brought you."

  Rigo smiled mirthlessly. "So there's a new Hierarch. I wish he had taken office earlier. Brother Zoe. If he had, I wouldn't be involved in this mess. Well, your authority doesn't matter! Even if you have none at all, it doesn't matter. I could refuse to tell you, but you could find it out from anyone out there in the hotel in ten minutes. There is no plague on Grass. Which means, at least by implication, there is a cure here, but we don't know where. Or what Or how. We don't know if people coming here are cured, and if so, permanently or only for a time. The answer is probably here on Grass. That's all we know."

  The Elder Brother pulled a handkerchief from the pocket of his robe and wiped his face with it. "I … I … that is, I apprec
iate your giving me this information, Ambassador." He turned and left the room, almost running.

  Rigo started after him, then stopped as he saw a folded piece of paper lying on the floor. It had fallen from the Brother's pocket when he pulled out his handkerchief. Rigo picked it up, smoothed it to see if it was important enough to send after the man.

  "My dear old friend Nods," it began in a clear, quirky handwriting, narrow and clear as print.

  Rigo read it all the way through in mounting disbelief, then read it again. "There is plague here, as there is everywhere else … It is not our desire that information about the cure be widely disseminated … wiping out the heathen to leave worlds for Sanctity alone to populate … "

  "Rigo."

  He turned to find her at his side. "Marjorie! They said you were with Stella." She looked very pale. Very tired.

  "I stopped in her room. I couldn't really see her. She's boxed up in a huge Heal-all. Rillibee stayed there with her."

  "How is she?"

  "The doctor says she hopes for recovery. She was careful not to say full recovery. I gather some things were destroyed." Marjorie rubbed at her eyes.

  He stood stiffly away from her, aware she had not reproached him and yet feeling reproached. He did not want to talk about their daughter, not yet. The paper cracked in his hand, reminding him. "You must look at this. The head of the Friary came to see me to ask about the plague. This thing fell out of his pocket." He thrust the letter at her.

  She read, read again, turning a white face toward him at last. "Sanctity won't spread the cure even if we find one?"

  "You read what I read. The man who signed that letter is the new Hierarch. Uncle Carlos may have been an apostate, but he wouldn't have been capable of this!"

  "What are we going to do?"

  "All I've done so far is wish I hadn't told the man anything. I don't know what to do next!"

  She touched him gently on the shoulder. "One thing at a time, Rigo. That's all any of us can do."

  "Very well. One thing at a time. There's an immediate threat from the Hippae at the tunnel. We'll probably end up having to kill all those damned Hippae … "

  "No!" she folded the letter and put it carefully in a flapped pocket of her jacket. "No! We can't kill them all. Not even most. They become other creatures. Important creatures. The foxen, Rigo. They're an intelligent race. Even the Hippae themselves are intelligent, in a way."

  "We're going to have to kill some," he objected, thinking that Marjorie did not sound like herself. "No matter what they become. If we don't, we die ourselves. We have to make Commons secure from them, or everyone here will die, just as the Arbai did."

  "Kill some," she agreed. "Yes. It will be necessary. But the fewest possible That's what I came to tell you. I heard what you said about enticing them away. We must use the horses."

  At first he wanted to laugh. When he had heard what she had to say, he wanted to cry. He objected, and she looked at him in firm decision, unlike herself. He could offer nothing better. Moved from mockery to despair, he stumbled out of the Port Hotel to make the preparations she had convinced him were necessary. Aircars could not get into the forest where the tunnel ended. At any threat from above, the Hippae would merely retreat into the swamp or the tunnel or both, as they had retreated from the aircar when Rigo had been wounded. If men were to destroy the tunnel, the Hippae would have to be enticed away. The Hippae hated the horses. They would use the horses.

  "At least … " he said to himself, trying to laugh, "at least I'll never have to wear those damned bon boots or those fat-bottomed pants again!"

  Not long after dawn they assembled in the great hay barn where the horses were stalled. They met without many words. What words had been necessary had already been carried from each to each, and they were all tired of words. Tired of words, afraid of action, yet determined nonetheless.

  Rigo, pale but resolute, was saddling El Dia Octavo. Marjorie had chosen Don Quixote. Tony took Blue Star, and Sylvan, Her Majesty. Irish Lass, they had regretfully decided, was not quick enough. That left only Millefiori.

  "I wish we had someone," Sylvan said, looking at the mare.

  "We do," said Marjorie. She was very calm. Father Sandoval had suggested he hear her confession and give her absolution. She had told him there wasn't time. She wasn't sure she wanted to confess anything. She wasn't sure anything needed confession. Even if it did, she didn't think she would, or could, share it, because she hadn't figured it out yet. "Tony, we do have someone."

  "Who?" he asked in surprise.

  "Me," said a voice from the door. She stood there in the light from outside, very pale, dressed in her bon riding coat and a hastily remodeled set of trousers. Rowena.

  Sylvan gasped. "Mother!"

  "I'm glad I have a child left to call me mother," she said coldly. "Have you seen Dimity, Sylvan?"

  He bowed his head, for a moment unable to reply. "I've seen her, yes. I know what condition she's in. But it won't help her for you to do this," he murmured. "You're not well, not healed … "

  "I promised Marjorie my help if ever she should need it. She needs it. And who else will do it? A few hours ago Marjorie took me out and taught me how. It's nothing. Nothing compared to what I did all my girlhood, most of my Obermum life, even after you were born, Sylvan. Oh, I've enough experience riding to get through this, I think. Have you seen Emmy, Sylvan? She looks almost like Dimity. Though the doctors say she will heal, in time."

  "Father did that," he said expressionlessly.

  "I don't blame Stavenger," she said. "Why blame a dead man? I blame the Hippae. I blame who's responsible, and that has always been the Hippae."

  "The bons and the foxen both deserve a share of blame," Marjorie said hotly. "The foxen let it happen. They allowed themselves a comfortable retirement. They let happen what would. Then, when it all went wrong, they chose to discuss it philosophically. When men came here, they learned new ideas of guilt and redemption and talked about that. They engaged in great theological arguments. They sent Brother Mainoa to find out if they could be forgiven. They talked of original sin, collective guilt. They're still doing it. They haven't learned that being penitent sometimes does no good at all." She pulled on a girth so furiously that Don Quixote whuffed in complaint.

  "Mother," Tony said. "Don't."

  "Damn it, Tony, they could help. They're great, powerful beasts, evolved to be so to protect themselves from something even more terrible that was long ago extinct. But they no longer do anything. They think. They discuss. They don't decide."

  "I thought when they helped you, they had decided," Rigo said. She had told him about the climbers.

  "Aaah," she growled, "Aaah. One of them helped me. By himself. I don't think even he would be much help against a dozen of the Hippae. Not alone. The rest of them are all sitting up there in the trees, thinking about it. Wondering what they might do if they ever decide to do anything. I made a mistake back there in the Tree City when I didn't kill those two climbers. I set a good example. They're all too ready to take a good example if it means they won't have to do anything and then take responsibility for it."

  For the tenth time she checked her lance, a strong spear of light metal alloy with a trigger mounted on it which would turn on a big laser knife, one of the kind they had given their workmen for harvesting grasses. The knife was mounted at the tip of the lance and was counterbalanced by a weight in the butt end. Roalds' workmen had built the lances as well as the bucklers each of them wore, a kind of light breastplate with a hook under the left arm to hold the end of the lance down. The breasts and flanks of the horses were armored in similar fashion, with light plates strung on tough fabric, to keep the weight down. Rigo had remembered the breastplates from armor he had seen, armor dating from a time when lances had been monstrously heavy and had had to be carried dead level.

  It didn't matter how level these were carried. Actually they would do more damage if they wobbled and swung. If they moved about a good deal, it w
ould do maximum damage at the greatest distance. Still, the hook would help to control them and keep the tips from dipping or catching on the ground – for at least one charge. Marjorie hadn't really intended a charge. She had suggested a quick sally to bring the Hippae away from the tunnel mouth in pursuit, and then a long flight which would keep the Hippae away long enough for Alverd's men to blow up the tunnel. Rigo, having seen what knives would do to Hippae flesh, had suggested improving their chances with weapons. So each of them had a lance plus a knife in a pocket. Armed or not, after one charge horses and riders would probably be fleeing for their lives. If they survived that long.

  There had been time for only a brief mounted practice with the lances. "Remember, horses are faster on the flat," Rigo had reminded them. "The Hippae will be faster running uphill. It's the way they're made. More like big cats than like horses. Their legs can give more thrusting power going up than going forward. We'll run on the flat, along the hill, slightly upward, not straight up. If we can make it to the gate at the order station, they'll let us through."

  The gate seemed an impossible goal as they left the great hay barn and rode across the paved area that separated it from the Port Hotel, around the empty hotel and hospital, to the slope leading down to the marsh. Each of them studied it, finding the route they would take when the Hippae came after them. If they went north they would shortly be trapped against the implacable ridge of Com. Besides, that's where Alverd's men were, waiting to move down to the tunnel as soon as the Hippae were decoyed away. So they would go south where they could run for miles in a wide arc, all the way around the grazing land to the ruts south of Portside Road and along Portside Road to Grass Mountain Road and the gate. The ground was the same wherever they would run. A grassy, weedy slope, uncultivated, scattered with rock and the break-leg holes of small migerish creatures. The sun was in their eyes. The marsh lay in shadow at the bottom of the slope, just outside the first fringe of trees. The Hippae were hidden. From time to time, the sound of their howling came up the hill. No one knew what they were waiting for.