last possible minute and then yelled for help.
“I suppose Dupont took it under advisement and warned you not to touch the man until it could be proved he wasn’t human?” he guessed. At her nod, he swore softly. It fitted too well. “Do you think this Athon is human?”
She shrugged, glancing bitterly at a framed copy of the Earth-Sayon covenant. “Who knows what a male incarnation would be like? And how can I tell about Earthmen when every one I have seen is different in size, shape—and even color? My hands are bound. If he is human, I can do nothing. If he is of Sdyon, he is beyond my power as an incarnation! Yet he must be stopped, for the good of both your world and mine. Here!”
She pulled a jewel-studded box to her and began removing papers from it, written in the native script. “Can you read these?” she asked. At his nod, she passed them over to him. “Take them with you. You’ll see he preaches both a Father-Principle and a Mother-Principle. He wants the riches of the temple stripped away and divided among everyone. He claims all races are equal. Eli, consider what that would do to Earth’s position! Or think how little you could deal with Sayon without the temple—as the temple cannot do without Earth now. Is Earth strong enough in this Sector today to conquer Sayon against a fanatic people—or to hold the other worlds if this planet breaks away?”
Abruptly, she stopped to study him. Then a slow, hard smile lifted the corners of her mouth. “I was desperate enough to think of bribing you, Eli. But a poor man after forty years in your Service must be ah honest one. Still, at least, you can see what I chose for you.”
It lay on the bottom of the box, gleaming iridescent in the light and silvery white in the shadows—a necklace of the almost mythical moon pearls. On Earth, one would buy full geriatric treatments and ten would win the governorship of almost any Sector he could name. His hand shook, but he managed a smile as he reached out to close the lid.
Her own laugh sounded strained as she put the box away. “Well, perhaps someday the Goddess will reward you for honesty. One can always hope,” she said. Then she heaved herself up and turned to the doorway. “I’ve got a chariot waiting to take you to the palace.”
It was on a nearby ramp that ran downward gradually until it passed through a narrow gate below the steps, but Judson hardly noticed the path the priestess driving it chose. He was cursing to himself and at himself as the picture of his interview with Kaia solidified in his thoughts. She’d given him a little information, shoved the entire responsibility on him, and—yes, damn it—she’d managed to offer him the moon pearls for his help! Those final words could only mean that. She’d managed it within an hour of meeting him; yet on her own ground and hi her own specialty, she couldn’t handle the problem she’d given him!
Abruptly, the chariot jerked to a jarring halt and began backing. He looked up. The street they had been about to enter—the main street between palace and temple—was crammed with some kind of procession. In the very center, however, there was a clear space where one heavily-robed figure moved by itself.
He caught the priestess’ hands as she tried to turn the team around. “Wait. Is that Athon?”
She nodded, hate and sickness on her face.
The binoculars did little good. The light was already failing, and the slow-moving figure seemed completely covered in a robe and hood. Judson turned to glance at the crowd, then focused in shoct on two of the Ludh bowmen, marching toward the rear! They had no business here! If the Ludh could be converted…
A startled noise from the mob broke the weird minor chant that had been rising, and he spun back to see a Sayonese man running toward the solitary marching figure. In one arm he was brandishing a sword weakly,
shouting as he ran. The flesh on his body was covered with the great scabs of brown skin-rot, and he was wasted to almost skeletal thinness.
The men nearest him started for him, just as he staggered. But there was still strength enough in his body. With a final yell, he raised the sword and plunged it deep into his own breast.
The robed figure stopped beside the threshing body on the street. A hand came out of the robe to pluck the sword easily from the wound, almost without touching it. Then the hand withdrew, and Athon bent over, as if chiding the dying man. Finally he straightened. The swordsman was quiet for a second. Then the body stirred, sat up, sprang to its feet with a wild cry of joy, and dashed back into the crowd. There were no brown scabs left on the emaciated figure.
The chant rose to a wild frenzy and the procession moved on. In the center, the robed figure seemed to shake its head sadly.
At Judson’s nod, the priestess got the chariot turned and began heading back through twisted alleys toward the palace. His mind was churning wildly on what he had seen. It was so completely beyond any use of healing power known to Earth—or even to the,legends here—that it could only be called a miracle, unless it had been the best-staged piece of trickery ever performed so openly.
If word of such things got back to Earth, there’d be ships headed here in droves from every cult known to man, filled with credulous fools and profiteers—and among them might well be some of the hereditary president’s family. Fas Kaia had been more truthful than she knew when she equated her danger with Earth’s. In the unstable conditions back there, just the knowledge that such things could be would threaten the whole system. Meia had been a danger once; Athon was doom! At the palace, Dupont and his homely sister, with the eight human assistants who comprised all the Earthmen hi Kalva, were in the middle of some vague attempt at a welcoming party, but they seemed relieved when Judson pleaded extreme fatigue. They’d probably turn it into a dope binge now, from rumors of what went on here, with Dupont’s sister being passed around from man to man, not excluding her brother. But that was none of Judson’s business. With the decreasing number of women who came away from Earth for any reason now, men couldn’t be blamed for making the most of whatever they could find. Earth put stiff penalties on consorting with aliens, but it happened sometimes, even on Ludh. For that matter…
He dropped the thought and unpacked in the apartment assigned to him. From the bottom of his small bag he drew a final piece—a tissue copy of
The contents only confirmed her words, without adding any new information. And even confirmation was meaningless, since they could be forgeries. He’d have to play things by ear, it seemed—and probably one of his problems would be the priestess herself.
But now the fatigue he had used as an excuse was turning to reality. He should call a slave to bathe him and prepare him for bed, but it was too much trouble. He made another futile attempt to think about his problems, then dropped onto the bed. He’d undress in a moment…
Priestesses, goddesses, prophets! The last thing he had ever wanted was to get mixed into another Sayonese religious mess. Once had been bad enough—and yet…
Thirty years before he grew old, a man could have plans for the future, even on an outworld in the Colonial Service. Eli’s hopes were based on a book dealing with the oddities in the ecological balance of a world where marsupials had won the race for domination. He was spending his biannual vacation by himself in the retreat of a village a hundred miles north of Kalva, using a building the Service had owned but abandoned.
The book was neatly finished, too, and he’d been practically assured rjutfjicaltion. Then there’d be recognition, promotion, a chance to return to Earth; in time, there’d be a wife to make up for ten years without women; there’d be children. He’d always wanted a son of his own, though the idea was growing old-fashioned in the current culture.
It might have worked, except for an unexpected storm that caught him taking a walk to clear his mind. The same storm found a window he’d left carelessly open and blew away his antibiotic kit and ruined his radio. That left only the native doctor, who knew nothing about pneumonia. Eli passed into a delirium with the unpleasant idea that he’d wake up only in heaven—in which he had no belief.
When he came to, he was less sure. He felt rotten, and his sight was cloudy, but there was either an angel or an Earth girl in the room, talking Sayonese with an old greeny. She wore native clothes, but no native had skin like that—or provocative hips—or such shoulders. Then as she turned, he grunted in surprise. Damned few Earth women looked that good without makeup, either. He began to consider the angel idea seriously.
She shook her head at him, switching to English that had almost none of the lisped dentals caused by Sayonese slotted palates. “I’m only a goddess,” she told him. “That is, I will be in another month. You’re lucky I
