Dying of the Light

Dirk was nodding. 'I've seen a Hruun or two during my travels. The other races are pretty much extinct, aren't they?'

'Perhaps,' Vikary said. 'I looked at the illustrations I had found for a long time, and returned to them again and again. There was a quality about them that disturbed me. Finally, I puzzled out the truth. The Hruun, the dactyloids, the githyanki-each bore a vague semblance to the gargoyles that sit at the door of every Kavalar holdfast. They were the demons of our myth cycles, Dirk!'

Vikary stood up and began to pace slowly up and down the length of the room, still talking, his voice even and controlled, his excitement showing only in the act of pacing. 'When Gwen and I returned to Iron-jade I put forward my theory, based on the old legends, the Demonsong cycle of the great poet- adventurer Jamis-Lion Taal, and on the Academy data banks. Consider its truth: The colony Cavanaugh stands, with its cities on the plains and its far-flung mining operations. The Hrangans level the cities with a nuclear bombardment. Survivors live only in the deep shelters and out in the wild, in the mines. To make the planet their own, the Hrangans also land contingents of their slaveraces. Then they depart, not to return for a century. The mines become the first holdfasts, others are built later, carved deep into stone. Their cities gone, the miners revert to a more primitive level of technology, and soon establish a rigid survival-oriented culture. For endless generations they war against the slaveraces and against each other. At the same time, beneath the radioactive ruins of the cities, human mutations begin to arise…'

Now Dirk stood up. 'Jaan,' he said.

Vikary stopped his pacing, turned, frowned.

'I have been very damn patient,' Dirk said. 'I understand that all this is of great concern to you. It's your work. But I want some answers and I want them now.' He raised his hand and ticked off the questions on his fingers. 'Who is Lorimaar? What did he want? And why do I have to be protected against him?'

Gwen rose too. 'Dirk,' she said, 'Jaan is only giving you the background you need to understand. Don't be so-'

'No!' Vikary quieted her with a wave of his hand. 'No, t'Larien is correct, I grow too enthusiastic whenever I speak of these matters.' To Dirk he said, 'I will answer you directly, then. Lorimaar is a very traditional Kavalar, so traditional that he is out of place even on High Kavalaan itself. He is a creature of another age. Do you recall yesterday morning, when I gave you my pin to wear, and Garse and I both expressed concern about your safety after dark?'

Dirk nodded. His hand went up and touched the small pin, snugly fastened to his collar. 'Yes.'

'Lorimaar high-Braith and others like him were the cause of our concern, t'Larien. The reasons are not easy to tell.'

'Let me,' Gwen said. 'Dirk, listen. The highbond Kavalars, the holdfast folk, always respected each other throughout the centuries– Oh, they fought and warred, so much that some twenty-odd holdfasts and coalitions were destroyed utterly, leaving only the four great surviving holdfasts of modern times. Still, they recognized each other as human, subject to the rules of highwar and the Kavalar code duello. But there were others, you see- solitary people in the mountains, people who dwelled under the ruined cities, farmers. Those are just guesses-mine and Jaan's– but the point is such people did exist, survivors outside the mining camps that became the holdfasts-those survivors the highbonds would not recognize as men and women. Jaan left something out of all that history, you see– Oh, don't fidget so. I know it was a long story, but it was important. You remember all that about the Hrangan slaveraces corresponding to the three demons of Kavalar myth? Well, the only problem with that is there are three slaveraces, but four kinds of demons. The worst and most evil demons of all were the mockmen.'

Dirk frowned. 'Mockmen. Lorimaar called me a mockman. I thought it was something like not-man, more or less.'

'No,' Gwen said. 'Not-man is a common term, mockman is unique to High Kavalaan. Shape-changers, the legends say, weres and liars. They can wear any form, but most often that of men, and they want to infiltrate the holdfasts. Inside, disguised as humans, they can secretly strike and kill.

'Those other survivors-the farmers and the mountain families and the mutants and the unlucky, the other humans on Cavanaugh-those were the mock-men, the werefolk. They were not allowed to surrender, the rules of highwar did not apply. The Kavalars exterminated them, never trusting any to be human. They were alien animals. After centuries, those that remained were hunted for sport. The holdfast men always hunted in pairs, teyn-and-teyn, so each could swear to the humanity of the other when they returned.'

Dirk looked aghast. 'Does this still go on?'

Gwen shrugged. 'Seldom. Modern Kavalars admit the sins of their history. Even before the starships came, the Ironjade Gathering and Redsteel, the most progressive coalitions, had banned the taking of mock-men. The hunters had a custom. When they did not wish to kill a mockman immediately, for whatever reason, but wanted him as their personal prey later, they would brand him korariel, and no one else would touch him under penalty of duel. The Ironjade and Redsteel kethi went out and ran down all the mockmen they could, set them up in villages, and tried to bring them back to civilization from the savagery they had fallen into. All they caught they named korariel. There was a brief highwar over it, Ironjade against Shanagate. Ironjade won, and korariel took on a new meaning, protected property.'

'And Lorimaar?' Dirk demanded. 'How does he fit in?'

She smiled wickedly, for a second reminding him of Janacek. 'In any culture, a few diehards remain, true believers and fundamentalists. Braith is the most conservative coalition, and about a tenth of them– Jaan's estimate-still believe in mockmen. Mostly hunters, who want to believe, and nearly all of them from Braith. Lorimaar and his teyn and a handful of his kethi are here to hunt. The game is more varied than on High Kavalaan, and no one enforces any game laws. In fact, there are no laws. The Festival pacts ended long ago. Lorimaar can kill anything he wants to.'

'Including humans,' Dirk said.

'If they can find them,' she said. 'Larteyn has twenty citizens, I believe-twenty-one with you. Us, and a poet named Kirak Redsteel Cavis who lives in an old watchtower, and a pair of legitimate hunters from Shanagate. The rest are Braiths. Hunting mock-men, and other game when they can't find mockmen. A generation older than Jaan, chiefly, and quite bloodthirsty. Except for stories they heard in their holdfasts, and maybe a few illicit man-kills in the Lameraan Hills, they know nothing of the old hunts except the legends. All of them are bursting with tradition and frustration.' She smiled.

'And this goes on? No one does anything?'

Jaan Vikary crossed his arms. 'I have a confession to make, t'Larien,' he said gravely. 'We lied to you yesterday, Garse and I, when you asked us why we are here. In truth, I was the one who lied. Garse told at least the partial truth-we must protect Gwen. She is an offworlder, no Kavalar, and the Braiths would gladly kill her for a mockman without the shield of Ironjade. The same is truth for Arkin Ruark, who knows nothing of this, not even that he has our protection. Yet he does. He too is korariel of Ironjade.

'Our reasons for being here go beyond that, however. It was vital that I leave High Kavalaan at the time I did. When I took on my highnames and published my theories, I became at once very powerful and celebrated in highbond council, and very hated. Many religious men took personal insult from my contention that Kay Iron-Smith was a woman. I was challenged six times on that account alone. In the last duel, Garse killed a man, while I wounded his teyn so badly that he will never walk again. I was not willing to let this go on. Worlorn was empty of enemies, it seemed. At my urging, the Ironjade council dispatched Gwen on her ecological project.

'Yet, at the same time, I became aware of Lorimaar's activity here. He had already taken his first trophy, and word had come back to Braith and spread to us. Garse and I discussed the matter and determined to stop it. The situation is explosive in the extreme. If the Kimdissi should learn that the Kavalars are hunting mockmen again, they would gladly spread the news to all the outworlds. There is little love lost between Kimdiss and High Kavalaan, as you may know. We do not fear the Kimdissi themselves, who espouse a religion and a philosophy as nonviolent as the Emereli. Other Fringe worlds are more dangerous. The Wolfmen are always volatile and erratic; the Toberians might end their trade agreements if they learn that Kavalars are hunting their laggardly tourists. Perhaps even Avalon would turn against us, should the news go beyond the Veil, and we would be barred from the