She swallowed, and nodded. “Yes, I did. He was happy, even more than the rest. He’s older. He’s near Final Union, and he’s very thrilled about it.” She spoke with her old easy manner; the after effects of reading the Joined seemed to have faded.
“Why?” I was musing out loud. “He’s going to die. Why is he so happy about it?”
Lya shrugged. “He wasn’t thinking in any great analytical detail, I’m afraid.”
I licked my fingers to get rid of the last of the grease. We were at a crossroads, with Shkeen bustling by us in all directions, and now we could hear more bells on the wind. “More Joined,” I said. “Want to look them up?”
“What would we find out? That we don’t already know? We need a human Joined.”
“Maybe one of this batch will be human.”
I got Lya’s withering look. “Ha. What are the odds?”
“All right,” I conceded. It was now late afternoon. “Maybe we’d better head back. Get an earlier start tomorrow. Besides, Dino is probably expecting us for dinner.”
* * *
Dinner, this time, was served in Valcarenghi’s office, after a little additional furniture had been dragged in. His quarters, it turned out, were on the level below, but he preferred to entertain upstairs where his guests could enjoy the spectacular Tower view.
There were five of us, all told: me and Lya, Valcarenghi and Laurie, plus Gourlay. Laurie did the cooking, supervised by master chef Valcarenghi. We had beefsteaks, bred on Shkea from Old Earth stock, plus a fascinating blend of vegetables that included mushrooms from Old Earth, groundpips from Baldur, and Shkeen sweethorns. Dino liked to experiment and the dish was one of his inventions.
Lya and I gave a full report on the day’s adventures, interrupted only by Valcarenghi’s sharp, perceptive questioning. After dinner, we got rid of tables and dishes and sat around drinking Veltaar and talking. This time Lya and I asked the questions, with Gourlay supplying the biggest chunk of the answers. Valcarenghi listened from a cushion on the floor, one arm around Laurie, the other holding his wine glass. We were not the first Talents to visit Shkea, he told us. Nor the first to claim the Shkeen were manlike.
“Suppose that means something,” he said. “But I don’t know. They’re not men, you know. No, sir. They’re much more social, for one thing. Great little city builders from way back, always in towns, always surrounding themselves with others. And they’re more communal than man, too. Cooperate in all sorts of things, and they’re big on sharing. Trade, for instance—they see that as mutual sharing.”
Valcarenghi laughed. “You can say that again. I just spent the whole day trying to work out a trade contract with a group of farmers who hadn’t dealt with us before. It’s not easy, believe me. They give us as much of their stuff as we ask for, if they don’t need it themselves and no one else has asked for it earlier. But then they want to get whatever they ask for in the future. They expect it, in fact. So every time we deal we’ve got a choice; hand them a blank check, or go through an incredible round of talks that ends with them convinced that we’re totally selfish.”
Lya wasn’t satisfied. “What about sex?” she demanded. “From the stuff you were translating last night, I got the impression they’re monogamous.”
“They’re confused about sex relationships,” Gourlay said. “It’s very strange. Sex is sharing, you see, and it’s good to share with everyone. But the sharing has to be real and meaningful. That creates problems.”
Laurie sat up, attentive. “I’ve studied the point,” she said quickly. “Shkeen morality insists they love everybody. But they can’t do it, they’re too human, too possessive. They wind up in monogamous relationships, because a really deep sex-sharing with one person is better than a million shallow physical things, in their culture. The ideal Shkeen would sex-share with everyone, with each of the unions being just as deep, but they can’t achieve that ideal.”
I frowned. “Wasn’t somebody guilty last night over betraying his wife?”
Laurie nodded eagerly. “Yes, but the guilt was because his other relationships caused his sharing with his wife to diminish. That was the betrayal. If he’d been able to manage it without hurting his older relationship, the sex would have been meaningless. And, if all of the relationships had been real love-sharing, it would have been a plus. His wife would have been proud of him. It’s quite an achievement for a Shkeen to be in a multiple union that works.”
“And one of the greatest Shkeen crimes is to leave another alone,” Gourlay said. “Emotionally alone. Without sharing.”
I mulled over that, while Gourlay went on. The Shkeen had little crime, he told us. Especially no violent crime. No murders, no beatings, no prisons, no wars in their long, empty history.
“They’re a race without murderers,” Valcarenghi said. “Which may explain something. On Old Earth, the same cultures that had the highest suicide rates often had the lowest murder rates, too. And the Shkeen suicide rate is one hundred percent.”
“They kill animals,” I said.
“Not part of the Union,” Gourlay replied. “The Union embraces all that thinks, and its creatures may not be killed. They do not kill Shkeen, or humans, or Greeshka.”
Lya looked at me, then at Gourlay. “The Greeshka don’t think,” she said. “I tried to read them this morning and got nothing but the minds of the Shkeen they rode. Not even a yes-I-live.”
“We’ve known that, but the point’s always puzzled me,” Valcarenghi said, climbing to his feet. He went to the bar for more wine, brought out a bottle, and filled our glasses. “A truly mindless parasite, but an intelligent race like the Shkeen are enslaved by it. Why?”
The new wine was good and chilled, a cold trail down my throat. I drank it, and nodded, remembering the flood of euphoria that had swept over us earlier that day. “Drugs,” I
said, speculatively. “The Greeshka must produce an organic pleasure drug. The Shkeen submit to it willingly and die happy. The joy is real, believe me. We felt it.”
Lyanna looked doubtful, though, and Gourlay shook his head adamantly. “No, Robb. Not so. We’ve experimented on the Greeshka, and . . .”
He must have noticed my raised eyebrows. He stopped. “How did the Shkeen feel about that?” I asked.
“Didn’t tell them. They wouldn’t have liked it, not at all. Greeshka’s just an animal, but it’s their God. Don’t fool around with God, you know. We refrained for a long time, but when Gustaffson went over, old Stuart had to know. His orders. We didn’t get anywhere, though. No extracts that might be a drug, no secretions, nothing. In fact, the Shkeen are the only native life that submits so easily. We caught a whiner, you see, and strapped it down, and let a Greeshka link up. Then, couple hours later, we yanked the straps. Damn whiner was furious, screeching and yelping, attacking the thing on its head. Nearly clawed its own skull to ribbons before it got it off.”
“Maybe only the Shkeen are susceptible?” I said. A feeble rescue attempt.
“Not quite,” said Valcarenghi, with a small, thin smile. “There’s us.”
* * *
Lya was strangely silent in the tube, almost withdrawn. I assumed she was thinking about the conversation. But the door to our suite had barely slid shut behind us when she turned toward me and wrapped her arms around me.
I reached up and stroked her soft brown hair, slightly startled by the hug. “Hey,” I muttered, “what’s wrong?”
She gave me her vampire look, big-eyed and fragile. “Make love to me, Robb,” she said with a soft sudden urgency. “Please. Make love to me now.”
I smiled, but it was a puzzled smile, not my usual lecherous bedroom grin. Lya generally comes on impish and wicked when she’s horny, but now she was all troubled and vulnerable. I didn’t quite get it.
But it wasn’t a time for questions, and I didn’t ask any. I just pulled her to me wordlessly and kissed her hard, and we walked together to the bedroom.
And we made love, really made love, more than poor Nor
mals can do. We joined our bodies as one, and I felt Lya stiffen as her mind reached out to mine. And as we moved together I was opening myself to her, drowning myself in the flood of love and need and fear that was pouring from her.
Then, quickly as it had begun, it ended. Her pleasure washed over me in a raw red wave. And I joined her on the crest, and Lya clutched me tightly, her eyes shrunk up small as she drank it all in.
Afterwards, we lay there in the darkness and let the stars of Shkea pour their radiance through the window. Lya huddled against me, her head on my chest, while I stroked her.
“That was good,” I said in a drowsy-dreamy voice, smiling in the star-filled darkness.
“Yes,” she replied. Her voice was soft and small, so small I barely heard it. “I love you, Robb,” she whispered.
“Uh-huh,” I said. “And I love you.”
She pulled loose of my arm and rolled over, propping her head on a hand to stare at me and smile. “You do,” she said. “I read it. I know it. And you know how much I love you, too, don’t you?”
I nodded, smiling. “Sure.”
“We’re lucky, you know. The Normals have only words. Poor little Normals. How can they tell, with just words? How can they know? They’re always apart from each other, trying to reach each other and failing. Even when they make love, even when they come, they’re always apart. They must be very lonely.”
There was something . . . disturbing . . . in that. I looked at Lya, into her bright happy eyes, and thought about it. “Maybe,” I said, finally. “But it’s not that bad for them. They don’t know any other way. And they try, they love too. They bridge the gap sometimes.”
“Only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence,” Lya quoted, her voice sad and tender. “We’re luckier, aren’t we? We have so much more.”
“We’re luckier,” I echoed. And I reached out to read her too. Her mind was a haze of satisfaction, with a gentle scent of wistful, lonely longing. But there was something else, way down, almost gone now, but still faintly detectable.
I sat up slowly. “Hey,” I said. “You’re worried about something. And before, when we came in, you were scared. What’s the matter?”
“I don’t know, really,” she said. She sounded puzzled and she was puzzled; I read it there. “I was scared, but I don’t know why. The Joined, I think. I kept thinking about how much they loved me. They didn’t even know me, but they loved me so much, and they understood—it was almost like what we have. It—I don’t know. It bothered me. I mean, I didn’t think I could ever be loved that way, except by you. And they were so close, so together. I felt kind of lonely, just holding hands and talking. I wanted to be close to you that way. After the way they were all sharing and everything, being alone just seemed empty. And frightening. You know?”
“I know,” I said, touching her lightly again, with hand and mind. “I understand. We do understand each other. We’re together almost as they are, as Normals can’t ever be.”
Lya nodded, and smiled, and hugged me. We went to sleep in each other’s arms.
* * *
Dreams again. But again, at dawn, the memory stole away from me. It was all very annoying. The dream had been pleasant, comfortable. I wanted it back, and I couldn’t even remember what it was. Our bedroom, washed by harsh daylight, seemed drab compared to the splendors of my lost vision.
Lya woke after me, with another headache. This time she had the pills on hand, by the bedstand. She grimaced and took one.
“It must be the Shkeen wine,” I told her. “Something about it takes a dim view of your metabolism.”
She pulled on a fresh coverall and scowled at me. “Ha. We were drinking Veltaar last night, remember? My father gave me my first glass of Veltaar when I was nine. It never gave me headaches before.”
“A first!” I said, smiling.
“It’s not funny,” she said. “It hurts.”
I quit kidding, and tried to read her. She was right. It did hurt. Her whole forehead throbbed with pain. I withdrew quickly before I caught it too.
“All right,” I said. “I’m sorry. The pills will take care of it, though. Meanwhile, we’ve got work to do.”
Lya nodded. She’d never let anything interfere with work yet.
The second day was a day of manhunt. We got off to a much earlier start, had a quick breakfast with Gourlay, then picked up our aircar outside the tower. This time we didn’t drop down when we hit Shkeentown. We wanted a human Joined, which meant we had to cover a lot of ground. The city was the biggest I’d ever seen, in area at any rate, and the thousand-odd human cultists were lost among millions of Shkeen. And, of those humans, only about half were actually Joined yet.
So we kept the aircar low, and buzzed up and down the dome-dotted hills like a floating rollercoaster, causing quite a stir in the streets below us. The Shkeen had seen aircars before, of course, but it still had some novelty value, particularly to the kids, who tried to run after us whenever we flashed by. We also panicked a whiner, causing him to upset the cart full of fruit he was dragging. I felt guilty about that, so I kept the car higher afterwards.
We spotted Joined all over the city, singing, eating, walking—and ringing those bells, those eternal bronze bells. But for the first three hours, all we found were Shkeen Joined. Lya and I took turns driving and watching. After the excitement of the previous day, the search was tedious and tiring.
Finally, however, we found something: a large group of Joined, ten of them, clustered around a bread cart behind one of the steeper hills. Two were taller than the rest.
We landed on the other side of the hill and walked around to meet them, leaving our aircar surrounded by a crowd of Shkeen children. The Joined were still eating when we arrived. Eight of them were Shkeen of various sizes and hues, Greeshka pulsing atop their skulls. The other two were human.
They wore the same long red gowns as the Shkeen, and they carried the same bells. One of them was a big man, with loose skin that hung in flaps, as if he’d lost a lot of weight recently. His hair was white and curly, his face marked by a broad smile and laugh wrinkles around his eyes. The other was a thin, dark weasel of a man with a big hooked nose.
Both of them had Greeshka sucking at their skulls. The parasite riding the weasel was barely a pimple, but the older man had a lordly specimen that dripped down beyond his shoulders and into the back of the gown.
Somehow, this time, it did look hideous.
Lyanna and I walked up to them, trying hard to smile, not reading—at least at first. They smiled at us as we approached. Then they waved.
“Hello,” the weasel said cheerily when we got there. “I’ve never seen you. Are you new on Shkea?”
That took me slightly by surprise. I’d been expecting some sort of garbled mystic greeting, or maybe no greeting at all. I was assuming that somehow the human converts would have abandoned their humanity to become mock-Shkeen. I was wrong.
“More or less,” I replied. And I read the weasel. He was genuinely pleased to see us, and just bubbled with contentment and good cheer. “We’ve been hired to talk to people like you.” I’d decided to be honest about it.
The weasel stretched his grin farther than I thought it would go. “I am Joined, and happy,” he said. “I’ll be glad to talk to you. My name is Lester Kamenz. What do you want to know, brother?”
Lya, next to me, was going tense. I decided I’d let her read in depth while I asked questions. “When did you convert to the Cult?”
“Cult?” Kamenz said.
“The Union.”
He nodded, and I was struck by the grotesque similarity of his bobbing head and that of the elderly Shkeen we’d seen yesterday. “I have always been in the Union. You are in the Union. All that thinks is in the Union.”
“Some of us weren’t told,” I said. “How about you? When did you realize you were in the Union?”
“A year ago, Old Earth time. I was admitted to the ranks of the Joined only a few weeks ago. The First J
oining is a joyful time. I am joyful. Now I will walk the streets and ring my bells until the Final Union.”
“What did you do before?”
“Before?” A short vague look. “I ran machines once. I ran computers, in the Tower. But my life was empty, brother. I did not know I was in the Union, and I was alone. I had only machines, cold machines. Now I am Joined. Now I am”—again he searched—“not alone.”
I reached into him, and found the happiness still there, with love. But now there was an ache too, a vague recollection of past pain, the stink of unwelcome memories. Did these fade? Maybe the gift the Greeshka gave its victims was oblivion, sweet mindless rest and end of struggle. Maybe.
I decided to try something. “That thing on your head,” I said, sharply. “It’s a parasite. It’s drinking your blood right now, feeding on it. As it grows, it will take more and more of the things you need to live. Finally it will start to eat your tissue. Understand? It will eat you. I don’t know how painful it will be, but however it feels, at the end you’ll be dead. Unless you come back to the Tower now, and have the surgeons remove it. Or maybe you could remove it yourself. Why don’t you try? Just reach up and pull it off. Go ahead.”
I’d expected—what? Rage? Horror? Disgust? I got none of these. Kamenz just stuffed bread in his mouth and smiled at me, and all I read was his love and joy and a little pity.
“The Greeshka does not kill,” he said finally. “The Greeshka gives joy and happy Union. Only those who have no Greeshka die. They are . . . alone. Oh, forever alone.” Something in his mind trembled with sudden fear, but it faded quickly.
I glanced at Lya. She was stiff and hard-eyed, still reading. I looked back and began to phrase another question. But suddenly the Joined began to ring. One of the Shkeen started it off, swinging his bell up and down to produce a single sharp clang. Then his other hand swung, then the first again, then the second, then another Joined began to ring, then still another, and then they were all swinging and clanging and the noise of their bells was smashing against my ears as the joy and the love and the feel of the bells assaulted my mind once again.