The Alien Way Page 5

  Jase felt sudden anxiety speed up his heartbeat.

  “You mean, sir,” he asked, in a calm, controlled voice, “you won’t be able to discover the planet of its origin?”

  “Oh, that—yes,” said the Examiner. “But there’s so much else we ought to know before we send an expedition to the originating planet—much of which we ought to be getting from this artifact. And we’re not.” He looked again at the papers of the report. That’s why I called you in. I thought we might get some clue from you … Incidentally,” his gaze swung back to center on Jase. “You aren’t scheduled to leave on another Scouting Survey Sweep, I hope? We want you here to answer questions if need be.”

  “Sir,” said Jase, “I have withdrawn myself from the Scouting Duty Lists.”

  “Good…” the Examiner nodded. His eyes ranged from foot to head of Jase’s black-furred figure, as erect as the skeletal angle between the Ruml pelvis and backbone would allow. “By the way, do you think you might find Honor working on my staff, here?”

  “You are too land, sir.”

  The Examiner nodded.

  “I guessed not,” he said. “This work here is too slow and dull for the energies of young bodies. Men your age want active duties like your Scouting work. Well, I’ll leave the offer open. Always provided you remain a man of adequate Honor, you can come back later on if you want.”

  He stared down at Jase.

  “You may surprise yourself and do just that,” he said. “When we’re young we want to do everything overnight. We have wild dreams of great Honors and the Founding of Kingdoms. And that’s the way it should be, of course. But after a few years it becomes time to remember that for everyone who founds a Kingdom and a Family, there must be the millions who care for all the other responsibilities of Honor. For there’s a greater responsibility on all of us even than that of being an honorable man—you look surprised, young man?”

  “I—” Jase stumbled. “I am a Secondcousin only.”

  "That makes no difference,” said the Examiner. “Even an orphan is a member of the race. And he, too, has his greater responsibility than that toward his own honor—his share in the responsibility to see that in the end he is part of an honorable race.” He stared at Jase in surprise, and not without kindness. “—Why do you mourn, young man?”

  “—I am not fit!” choked Jase.

  “Come!” said the Examiner. “Didn’t I say that dreams and fantasies are proper to the young?—And where would we be if ever and again, at great, rare intervals, a Founder should not grow out of such dreams? I only warned you not to forget everything else in the search for personal Honor. Come—” said the Examiner, again kindly, “I see you’re a very sensitive young man. If you live another five seasons, you may be the sort of whom we can all be proud. —You may go now.”

  Jase inclined his head and backed away. He went out, still deeply affected by what the honorable old man had said. It was not until he was actually clear of the huge complex of structures that was the Examination Center, that he got his feelings under control. He headed toward the Brokerage offices in the city center, wondering about himself. It was so strange—at one moment his ambition was such that he seemed to look down on all men, past and present; then, in the next minute, a word or two like those he had just heard was enough to make him feel less worthy than the meanest orphan cripple in a charity ward. He shook his head, baffled.

  By the time he had arrived at the Brokerage Center, however, he had put the emotion behind him and was once more in the vein of the determination that had dominated his life since the moment when the artifact had first registered on his Scout Ship instruments. He found the Broker that Bela Firstcousin had recommended to him and gave the Broker his list of worths.

  The Broker ran a practiced eye down the list and then turned to his computer connection and checked out the current values of the items on the list, worth by worth. When he was done, he nodded thoughtfully, typed out a total, and passed the list back to Jase.

  “Not bad at all for a Secondcousin in his second season,” the Broker said. He was a Rod, of the family Machidae, who had always been friendly to the Brutogasi—it went back to a gift of water made by the original Brutogas to the young Founder of the Machidae. “Of course, it’s that credit devolving from your public reward for finding that artifact that boosts the total out of the ordinary. What was it you wanted to do with the list?”

  “Liquidate it,” said Jase. The Broker raised his eyebrows.

  It took some little conversation for Jase to convince the Broker—a sensible man already well on his way toward an honorable age—that he meant what he said. And even more talk to convince the Broker that the final item of emergency demand upon the Family coffers of the Brutogasi was to be included in the liquidation.

  “That,” said the Broker, finally, “you can’t do—or rather, I won’t do it for you. Probably, if you can try hard enough, you can find some unscrupulous individual who’ll liquidate it for you—but I won’t. What I will do is lend to you against it—up to three-quarters of its value. At that, I’m trespassing against my own Honor and the friendship between our two Families. You realize what'll happen if you can’t pay back that loan within one season, don’t you?"

  “Yes,” said Jase.

  “Well, I’ll repeat it to you, anyway,” said the Broker. “If you haven’t paid it back by due date, it becomes payable against the Brutogas coffers. And you know what that means. Your family head will pay it immediately, but the minute he does so, you become a potential liability to the family—since any further indebtedness would also have to be paid, but you would have no personal credit with the Family coffers to absorb the payment. In self-defense, your Family will have to disavow you. Do you know what it means to live without the protection of your Family?”

  “Honorable men have lived that way before,” said Jase, stoutly.

  “Honorable giants! Honorable geniuses!” said the Broker. “Hardly anything as feeble as ordinary honorable men. Most ordinary men, no matter how individually honorable, either suicide shortly afterward or are killed by some Familied individual, knowing it is quite safe to do so for private purpose without question—as is only right, of course. There’d be little point in our having Families if it was easy to exist outside them. But the point is a disavowed man seldom lasts more than a matter of days, at best. And it’s a purposeless, unrewarding way to come to death. —You still want to do it, though?”

  “Yes,” said Jase, though his stomach contracted. His imagination was so strong that he could almost feel the horrible loneliness of being without Family or name.

  “All right,” said the Broker. “—And you won’t tell me why you want the money?”

  "I'd rather not,” said Jase.

  “Very well. I’ve said as much to you as my conscience required, and as much as mariners will let me. That concludes our business then. It’ll actually take an hour or so to put the papers through, but for practical purposes you can start honoring drafts against that sum I’ve written down immediately.”

  Jase thanked him and went out.

  Outside the office, once more in the white sunlight, Jase wasted no time taking a shuttle bus through the tunnels to the far side of the city, where the pools and gymnasiums were. In the Center for the Salles d'Armes, Jase found and entered one of these establishments where the instructor specialized in teaching the use of the duelling sword. He almost passed the entrance at first, for it was a simple, bare room with only a small pool in the center of it and some bare seating platforms around the walls. Then he saw the sign, small above the entrance, announcing that this was the school of Brodth Youngerbrother Clanth, Swordsmaster. He went in.

  Once inside he heard the shuffle of feet and the ring of metal on metal from an inner room. There was no door to this inner room, which was surprising-or rather, would have been surprising with anyone but a Swordsmaster of Brodth Youngerbrother’s reputation, Jase (or rather, Kator) reminded himself. It would be a matter of Honor
with such a Swordsmaster to employ neither public nor private Keysman.

  Jase stepped into the inner room. The scene he entered on was of a high-ceilinged, brightly lit, rectangular chamber, with three pairs of fencers fencing, and a lean, tall Ruml almost abnormally erect of back, moving from group to group and giving instruction. Occasionally he clapped his hands together for several seconds to get a fencer back into the steady rhythm necessary for swordswork.

  “—Lean into it!” his harsh, rather high-pitched voice was saying exasperatedly to one of the fencers in the pair farthest from the room’s entrance. “Lean into your stroke! And again! And again! —The stroke comes from the hips—so!—And again!—”

  Catching sight of Jase, he broke off and came over toward the entrance, walking with the swift metronomic balance of a trained swordsman-his footfalls steady as the ticking of a superb piece of clockwork.

  “Sir?” he said, looking down at Jase. “I am Swordsmaster Brodth.”

  “I want to enroll as a student of the sword,” said Jase.

  “An Honor to have you—” Brodth inclined his slightly graying head. “You are undoubtedly aware that my rates are somewhat higher than the ordinary—?”

  “Yes,” said Jase. “I know. I don’t mind paying triple rates to study under a Race Champion.”

  “Thank you,” said Brodth, inclining his head again, with no change of expression. He turned slightly and indicated the fencing couples. “All three of my assistants are engaged at the moment, so you can pick the one that you’d prefer. All three have openings in their schedules. If I might make a suggestion …How experienced are you with the duelling weapon?”

  “I’ve worked steadily with it for two seasons,” said Jase. “Of course… on my own. And with others in my Family.”

  “I see. Well, if I might suggest Lyth Cousincousin. He may be a little too strong for you to begin with—he’s my best assistant—but if you’re willing—“

  “I wanted,” said Jase, “to study with you.”

  “But you are studying with me— ” Brodth broke off. The skin around his nose tightened, and his eyes narrowed. “Sir,” he said dryly. “I am not for hire. If you wish to study directly with a swordsmaster, there are other salles d'armes—“

  “Sir,” said Jase. "My last desire as an honorable man is to offend you in any way. My situation is unusual and severe. Within a matter of days I’m going to have to fight and beat a man as skilled as the average Swordsmaster.”

  Brodth looked at him.

  “And who,” he inquired, still dryly, “might this man be?"

  “I don’t know,” said Jase. “But he'll probably be a Champion of one of the Heads of Family.”

  Brodth stared at him for a second longer. Then the tightening about his nose relaxed, and his eyes relaxed to let humor enter them.

  “At least,” he said, “you’re not some young puppy who thinks he can buy the right to boast that he has Brodth Youngerbrother for his personal fencing instructor.”

  “Sir,” said Jase humbly, “I would even be glad to keep it a secret if you want it so.”

  Brodth chortled. Like most Swordsmasters, Jase saw, he had long ago got over being touchy about his personal Honor—which no ordinary layman was liable to challenge in any case. Jase’s hopes lifted. He had hoped for much, but he had not dared hope that Brodth would be possessed of a sense of humor.

  “Well, well,” said the Swordsmaster. “Come here.” He led Jase across to a rack of the long, twin-bladed, basket-hilted duelling foils—identical in all save edge and point with the actual weapons used in an affair of Honor. “Choose one,” he told Jase, “and run through the first twenty-six beats of the primary drill. I can tell all I need to know by watching you.”

  The fur matting a little with perspiration under his chin, Jase scanned the rack of swords. There were weights and lengths there for all sizes of man. As Swordsmaster, let alone the man who had won the supreme Championship in the interworld competitions of the best of the Rural race, Brodth would have unhesitatingly chosen the heaviest and longest for himself. But Jase, only two seasons adult, was barely average height for a Ruml and no more than average weight.

  He reached out and chose a sword that he judged to be even a few ounces lighter and shorter than the one he exercised with back at the Brutogasi Castle. He balanced it in his fist, point up, then swung it a few times to get the feel of the particular suppleness of its long, narrow twin blades. Then—he stamped once on the floor to give himself the beat and lunged into the first of the primary drill movements.

  He attacked in five movements, retreated in four, attacked in six, retreated in two, attacked in two, retreated in two, attacked in four… and was suddenly overwhelmed by self-consciousness. His fifth attack movement, the concluding lunge, saw him stumble and almost lose his feet.

  He pulled himself erect, his neck-fur soaked with the sweat of self-hatred and misery. He replaced the sword in its rack and turned to face the expected cold invitation by Brodth to leave the establishment.

  But it did not come. Brodth was looking at him curiously.

  “I don’t know what …” Jase was beginning to stammer, when Brodth cut him short with a negligent wave of one hand.

  “That fault?” said the Swordsmaster. “Nothing. You suddenly remembered I was watching. In an actual duel you’d have had no emotion left over to make a fool of yourself. No…” He considered Jase, rubbing his chin. “You’re not bad. You didn’t choose a sword too heavy for you to show off in front of me. Your reflexes are really excellent. And when you faulted just now, you didn’t try to blame it on an unfamiliar weapon or the polish on the floor.”

  He fell silent, rubbing his chin and studying Jase.

  “Then…?” asked Jase. “You think it’s possible? I could be trained to win—”

  Brodth dropped his hand from his chin.

  “Against Family Head’s Champion?” he said, frankly. “Never in a thousand years. As I say, your reflexes are excellent. If that were all—” he twitched his head, shruggingly, “but you’re too small, my young friend.” He looked at Jase almost with sympathy. “A Family Champion will have half an arm’s length reach on you, and a third again the weight—to say nothing of experience, and possibly reflexes as fast as yours.”

  He shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “Take my advice-and I won’t even charge you for it. Just don’t challenge this man.”

  “I’m afraid…,” said Jase, “there’s no choice.”

  “No choice?” Brodth stared down at him “What do you mean? He can’t have challenged you—that wouldn’t be possible. And he can’t crowd you into challenging him. Look here,” said Brodth, “if somebody’s been taking advantage of you on the strength of his position or ability as Champion to the Head of a Family—“

  “No. Nothing like that,” said Jase. “As I told you, I don’t even know who I must challenge. But I will be challenging someone like that before long.” He hesitated. “Sir, I repeat the last desire I have is to offend you, but if you could give me a little help with the sword, even though you know it’s hopeless…” He reached and got the list of worths from his harness pouch and handed it to the Swordsmaster. “I have an adequate drawing account, and even the instruction of one of your assistants—"

  “Sword and my Honor!” exploded Brodth, staring at the list. “You’ve pledged your Family coffer-rights?—To pay for fencing lessons?”

  Jase’s neck trembled. He caught himself just in time from reaching out to pluck the list back from the Swordsmaster’s grasp. He had only intended to show the other man the total. His eyes burned with embarrassment. The fencing room seemed to rock around him. He looked right and left, expecting to see the assistants and pupils all having ceased fencing and staring at him. But, he saw suddenly, except for himself and Brodth, the room was empty. The others had concluded their efforts and gone.

  “I plan…” Jase’s voice was husky. “I plan a great effort..."

  “But you
young idiot!” said Brodth, with a Master Swordsman’s indifference to the need for respecting other men’s touchiness about name-calling. “Don’t you realize you could be disavowed if you can’t pay the pledge in time? And where’s someone your age to get a sum like that? What are you counting on-Founding a Kingdom?”

  “Yes,” admitted Jase, miserably. “I—”

  He broke off, seeing Brodth staring at him, and became belatedly aware that the other man had not meant his question seriously.

  “You… are!" said the Swordsmaster, finally. “You actually think… Do you know what the odds are against one man…?”

  Jase nodded grimly.

  “That’s why I didn’t intend to mention it to anyone,” he said, stiffly. “May I depend on you as an honorable man to keep my inadvertent admission to yourself—"

  “Yes, yes, of course…” muttered Brodth, still staring at him. “What’s your name?”

  Jase told him. Brodth stared for a second longer, then his eyes lit with recognition.

  “You’re the scout that encountered that artifact in space some weeks back!” said the Swordsmaster.

  “Yes,” said Jase, shortly. He turned toward the entrance. “Well, sir, if none of your assistants are able to take me—”

  “Wait!” said Brodth.

  Jason turned about. The Swordsmaster was looking at him strangely.

  “You may not think it,” said Brodth, slowly. “But I was a young idiot myself once. I had thoughts of Founding a Kingdom—” For a moment emotion lighted his gaze. “And it was not farfetched at that…” he muttered, “Race Champion three seasons running… I might have gone one step farther.” He raised eyes and voice together and spoke sharply to Jase. “Come with me.”

  He led the way back into the anteroom with the pool and by a closed door Jase had not noticed there before into a room that was half office, half the lounge of a suite of living quarters. He led Jase on through another door off the lounge into a room set up like a small, bare gym. On the walls of it hung various weapons, ancient and modern.