LITMIR.BIZ

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      Lord Pall, caught in the freeze of Hanuman’s ice-blue eyes, fluttered his fingers for a moment and said, ‘We can’t be too cautious with the warrior-poets. What arrangements have you made, Lord Hanuman?’

      This was the first time that Danlo had heard Hanuman addressed as ‘lord’, and he saw that Hanuman accepted this title as a warlord might tribute from a defeated enemy.

      ‘These arrangements,’ Hanuman said in his golden voice that filled the Lords’ College like sunlight. He nodded to another horologe who stood outside the door to one of the room’s antechambers. The horologe opened the door, carved with the figures of some of the Order’s most famous lords. And then a cadre of Ringists – six strong-looking men wearing the golden robes identical to Hanuman’s – strode across the black floor and surrounded the chair where Malaclypse sat waiting for them.

      ‘This is uncalled for!’ Burgos Harsha protested. ‘These men aren’t of the Order, and they have no place here!’

      ‘No, it’s just the opposite,’ Hanuman said. ‘I have called them here – they’re my personal guard. My godlings. And their place is by my side.’

      So saying, he nodded at the first of the Ringists, a hard and cruel-looking man who had once been a warrior-poet before he had deserted his Order to turn ronin. His own eyes, perhaps destroyed in some private war or torture among his violent kind, had been replaced with jewelled eyes: cold, glittering, mechanical orbs that were horrible to look upon. And yet Malaclypse Redring, who sat so close to where this fearsome man stood, looked at him as easily and penetratingly as if he could see through these twin computers straight into the man’s soul. In truth, it was the ronin warrior-poet who had difficulty looking at Malaclypse. With great wariness, he removed a spinneret from a pocket of his robe. He thumbed the trigger, causing a fine jet of liquid proteins to squirt out of the nozzle. Upon contact with the room’s cool air, the proteins immediately hardened into an incredibly tough filament known as acid wire. It took the ronin warrior-poet only a few moments to make many circles with the spinneret about Malaclypse, binding his arms and legs to the chair. Now, if Malaclypse made the slightest motion, the glittering wire would cut into him and touch his nerves like acid.

      ‘This is really too much!’ Burgos Harsha protested again. He, like every other lord in the room, must have wondered (and feared) how Hanuman had managed to convert a former warrior-poet to the Way of Ringess

      And Hanuman replied, ‘No, Lord Historian, again, it’s just the opposite. It’s really not enough.’

      Hanuman nodded at the ronin, whose name was Jaroslav Bulba. Jaroslav – and one of the other golden-robed godlings – immediately began to search Malaclypse for weapons.

      ‘But surely Malaclypse Redring has already been well searched!’

      ‘No, Lord Historian,’ Hanuman said. ‘He’s a warrior-poet, and so surely he hasn’t been searched well enough.’

      While the second godling, who was also a ronin warrior-poet, ran a scanner over Malaclypse’s arms, torso and legs, Jaroslav Bulba dared to pick through his thick, shiny hair. Hanuman had chosen Jaroslav as leader of his personal guard for his loyalty and courage (and cruelty), and Jaroslav could scarcely wait to inflict his rage at his former Order upon a warrior-poet who wore two red rings. Because he secretly feared this man who might well be able to kill him as easily as he might a furfly, he sought to face his fear in the crudest of ways. Courageously – but stupidly and for no good reason – he clamped his fingers in Malaclypse’s hair and jerked his head to the right and left. It must have emboldened him to manhandle Malaclypse so, for his jewelled eyes glowed red like plasma lights. And then, as he examined the black and white curls above Malaclypse’s temples, suddenly, without warning, Malaclypse opened his mouth – like a serpent about to strike with venomed fangs, or so Jaroslav must have perceived. For he immediately jumped back and knocked into the other godling, nearly causing him to drop his scanner. But Malaclypse had neither drug darts to spit at Jaroslav nor venom, but only words. ‘I’ll remember you,’ he said. ‘When your Moment of the Possible comes, I’ll remember who you really are.’

      After that, Jaroslav completed his search with the greatest circumspection if not gentleness. As did the other ronin warrior-poet. In little time, they had amassed a truly astonishing cache of weapons: red-tipped needles sewn into the fabric of Malaclypse’s robe; acid wire sewn as the fabric of his robe; plastic explosive moulded into the lining of his boots; two poison teeth; a heat-tlolt; two finger knives; three flesh pockets containing biologicals, most likely programmed bacteria or some sort of murderous virus; and perhaps most astonishing of all, the warrior-poet’s killing knife: a long blade of diamond-steel set into a black nall haft. Surely, Danlo thought, even the most cursory of searches would have uncovered this most revered of all a warrior-poet’s weapons. How Malaclypse had smuggled it into the College of Lords remained a mystery.

      ‘It’s done, Lord Hanuman,’ Jaroslav said. He held the double-edged killing knife in his sweaty hand and pointed it at Malaclypse. ‘This warrior-poet is no danger now.’

      Now completely unarmed though he was, Malaclypse’s eyes cut into Jaroslav like violet knives. ‘It’s said that whoever touches a warrior-poet’s knife, that knife shall touch him.’

      ‘I’ll remember that,’ Jaroslav said, as he slipped the long knife through the black belt he wore around his robe. ‘I’ll keep your knife, should it ever be necessary for me to touch you.’

      Hanuman looked at Lord Pall, and he raised one eyebrow, slightly. And Lord Pall said, ‘It’s time that we heard from the ambassadors of the Fellowship. Lord Bede, Danlo wi Soli Ringess – if you please.’

      ‘Lords of the Order,’ Demothi Bede began. As eldest, both he and Danlo thought it seemly that he should speak first. ‘My lords, Lord Hanuman li Tosh, we’ve been charged with a mission to end this war before the worst of it begins. We’ve been charged with the power to negotiate a peace acceptable to both the Fellowship and the Order. Danlo wi Soli Ringess and I are to remain on Neverness as long as is needed to conclude these negotiations.’

      He went on to make a fine little speech as to the great traditions of the Order in bringing the light of reason and the ineffable flame of truth to the Civilized Worlds. It was his hope, he said – and the hope of everyone – that reason and truth would eventually prevail.

      When he had finished speaking, Hanuman glanced in Lord Pall’s direction and tapped his thumbs together as he rolled his left shoulder forwards slightly. And Lord Pall said, ‘We, too, hope that truth will prevail. In the service of truth, then, we invite you to state your demands.’

      ‘My Lord Pall, I should hardly like to begin negotiations by characterizing the Fellowship’s concerns as—’

      ‘State your demands,’ Lord Pall fairly snapped. Because he chafed at Hanuman’s intimidation and control of him, he now sought to intimidate and control others. ‘We’ve little time for the niceties of diplomacy. With every word we waste, your fleet falls nearer to Neverness.’

      And so, without further ado, Demothi Bede was forced to tell the College of Lords the Fellowship’s purpose in waging war. He accused the Order of violating the Law of the Civilized Worlds in using assembler technology to mine the moons of Neverness and construct Hanuman’s Universal Computer. The Fellowship’s foremost ‘demand’, he said, must be that the Order cease the mining of these moons and disassemble the Universal Computer before the wrath of some jealous god fell upon the Civilized Worlds and destroyed them.

      ‘Of course, the Order will be free to pursue the religion of Ringism – any person on any of the Civilized Worlds will be,’ Demothi said. ‘But the Law of the Civilized Worlds must be inviolate. We’re here, in part, to negotiate a set of agreements that will ensure that Ringism doesn’t lead any person or world into the black whirlpools of chaos outside the Law.’

      With a sigh at what he saw in the stony faces of a hundred and twenty lords staring at him. Lord Demothi Bede bowed to Danlo to indicate that he had no more to say. And then Danlo touched the poison diamond brooch pinned

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