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CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
"You asked to see me, Your Excellency?" Captain Pahner asked.
From Roger's description, the room was the same one in which he'd met with Gratar during the Hompag. The previous meeting, however, hadn't included Grath Chain, who stood by the far wall. Mardukans didn't go in much for facial expressions, but the councilor looked like a three-meter cat who'd just swallowed a two-meter canary ... or basik.
"Yes, Captain," the priest-king said, stepping away from the window and walking to the small throne on the far side of the room. His guards eyed Pahner nervously; obviously, something was up.
Gratar sat on the throne and rubbed one gem-encrusted horn thoughtfully as he looked at the floor. Then he raised his eyes to the human and clasped his hands before him.
"I have been given unpleasant news by Grath Chain," he said.
"I could play dumb," the Marine responded, "but there wouldn't be much point."
"Then you admit that you were-are-aware that there is a plot to overthrow the Throne of God?" the king asked very quietly.
"We were, and are. And if you hadn't decided to fight the Boman, we would have supported it," the captain told him. "My armored platoon was prepared to assault the Drying Ceremony, with orders to seize you and terminate Sol Ta and Grath Chain with prejudice."
The king clasped his hands again and lowered his head in regret.
"I have come to know and trust you, Captain, and as for the traitors of whose actions Grath has informed me ... Many of them are men I know and trust and, yes, love as brothers." The king raised his head and looked at the human with sorrow, reproach ... and building anger. "How could you be so disloyal?"
"I'm not disloyal, Your Excellency," Pahner told him levelly. "Nor, however, am I a Diaspran. My loyalty is to my mission, and my mission, as we explained to you on our arrival, and to the conspirators when they finally approached us, is to deliver Roger, alive and sane, to his mother. Any action we have to take to secure that reunion is an act of loyalty on our part. Any action, Your Excellency, no matter how personally repugnant it may be."
"So you would have overthrown the Throne of God?" the king snapped. "I should have your head for this! And I will have the heads of every member of this cabal!"
"The head of your recently victorious war leader?" Pahner asked with a raised eyebrow. "And of your second in command, the architect of so many of your favorite Works? The heads of the leaders of the Warriors of God? The head of your own guard force? Most of the members of your Council, all of whom manage businesses or farms that are the lifeblood of this city?"
"I-" Gratar paused. "Tell me the rot isn't so deep," he said despairingly.
"What rot, Your Excellency?" Pahner asked.
"The hatred of the Throne of God!" the priest snapped. "And through that, the hatred of the God, Himself!"
"Who said they hated the Throne of God?" the Marine inquired with a slight smile, pulling out a length of bisti root. "And who said that they hate the one who sits on the Throne of God? Do they chafe at the restrictions imposed by your defenses against the Wrath? Yes. Do they think those defenses are far more extensive and costly, in both time and effort, than they need to be? Yes. But they all swore to the depth of their admiration for you, personally, and not one of them has mentioned hatred of the God."
"Then why do they seek to overthrow me?" Gratar asked in confusion.
"I suppose I have to ask another question to answer that," Pahner said, popping a slice of the bisti root into his mouth. "How many canals and dikes does the God want?"
"Listen to him not, Your Excellency!" Chain exclaimed. "He but seeks to blind you with the false words of his people!"
"Shut up, Grath. Or I'll feed you your left horn through your butt-hole," Pahner said mildly. "You've obviously had your say. Now it's time for somebody else to talk."
Gratar seemed to pay the interplay little attention. He only waved vaguely at Chain, and his eyes were fixed on the human.
"How many dikes?" he asked. "As many as necessary to secure the city against the Wrath. We were lucky in the Hompag and lost only the outermost defenses, despite our inattention. But we must not depend upon 'luck' or forget the lesson of the Auteans."
"Lucky?" Pahner shook his head. "Your Excellency, I was under the impression that these rains were particularly fierce. That it had been twenty rains since last they were this heavy, and that only two rains in all of your recorded history have exceeded their intensity."
"Yes, but we were given a reprieve by the God," the priest returned. "We fought the Boman in His name, and so he forgave us for our inattention and chose not to overwhelm us as He could have. He might not always be so forgiving."
"Or, possibly," Pahner said carefully, "the outer defenses were sufficient against the threat. Isn't it possible that the God was satisfied with just them?"
The priest-king leaned back and clasped all four hands once more.
"Is this the crux of their argument? That there are too many Works to the Glory of the God? That we should follow the path of Aut and spread ourselves to the winds?"
Pahner looked that one over carefully before he replied.
"I'd say that that is the crux of the argument, more or less, of those who are honest in what they say," he admitted after a moment. "There are some," he gestured with his chin at Chain, "who were in it only for power or profit, no question; there are those among the conspirators that are the Sons of Mary to be sure. But even some or all of those believed that Diaspra would be a greater city if there were fewer Laborers of God and more ... 'Laborers of Diaspra,' I guess you could put it. Laborers free to find their own work. Artisans free to work on something besides 'pumps, pumps, pumps that are never used.' "
"Rus From," Gratar sighed. "My oldest and, I thought, best friend. I'd heard his complaints before, but I thought them nothing more than ... mild blasphemies."
"Rus is your friend, Your Excellency," Pahner said seriously, "and he certainly worships the God. True, he worships the art of technology, as well, but there's no real need for the one to exclude the other. It's just that he needs a greater challenge than, well, 'pumps, pumps, pumps.' "
"What shall I do?" the priest-king asked in a near wail. "My Council is against me, most of my soldiers are against me, the merchants are against me... . My back is to the wall, Captain Pahner!"
"Not quite," the Marine said. "Sol Ta supports you."
"Grath tells me otherwise," Gratar said, looking at the Council member.
"The human lies," Chain said. "Sol Ta has professed his hatred for you. He seeks your overthrow, that he might keep command of this accursed 'New Model Army,' and Bogess has promised it to him for his support."
Pahner gazed at him speculatively for a few seconds, then shrugged.
"That's the first I've heard of this, Your Excellency, and once we figured out what was going on we used some of our devices to infiltrate the cabal pretty thoroughly. We knew almost everything that was happening, I think, and all we've heard says that Sol wasn't even approached because he thinks darkness comes and goes at your command. Which was why, despite the feelings of the conspirators, he had to go to the wall right away. I can't, of course, explain why the testimony of such a selfless and trustworthy soul as Grath Chain might contradict that of every single other person involved, but perhaps some explanation for that might occur to you."
He and Gratar gazed into one another's eyes, and the beleaguered priest-king actually grunted a ghost of a laugh, but then the human continued.
"If you want a serious suggestion about what you should do, though, I have one. Several actually."
"I'll listen," Gratar said. "I've always found your advice to be, I believed, honest and well thought out."
"That's my job," Pahner told him, and clasped his hands behind him.
"Whatever happens, things are going to change," he began. "You took four thousand menial workers and turned them into pretty fair soldiers, and when the wounded heal, there will still be well over three thousand of them left. Some are going to be willing, even eager, to go back to their old jobs, but many others will be discontented. They'll feel that since they and their mates saved the city, the city owes them a living from here on."
"That isn't a logical conclusion," Gratar interrupted. "They saved the city because otherwise they themselves would have been killed when the city fell."
"But it's a conclusion they'll reach," Pahner said flatly. "In fact, some will already have reached it. It's common, almost inevitable, among veterans, and however illogical, it's still something you'll have to deal with. They've ... changed. They've seen the high and the wide, and they can't go back to just rolling the lawn for the abbott."
"This is a nightmare," Gratar muttered, shaking his head.
"Don't think of it that way, Your Excellency," the Marine advised. "Instead, regard it as a test-one like the Wrath. You must put dikes where they're needed to stem the flow of change, and canals where they're needed to divert it into other cha
The priest-king gazed at him, his body language arrested, and Pahner smiled.
"The other issue, of course, is the cabal and their feelings about the Works of God. Now, there's a saying in my land, that 'when you have one problem, you have a problem; but when you have a bunch of problems, sometimes they solve each other.' You're going to have to do something with your veterans. Many societies, placed in a similar pressure cooker, end up with an army they have to use, and so they proceed to go out and conquer everything in sight until stopped. For example, you realize that you could take over Chasten's Mouth and most of the other broken city-states rather easily?"