He told Sutha everything that had happened to him since the day in London when Lord Leighton had pressed the computer button. Sutha listened without once interrupting. Nor did the High Priestess, who was listening somewhere in the Palace, send her voice into the room.
Blade finished. Sutha stroked his chin and stared, but with nothing of amazement. There was even a hint of boredom in his voice.
"Our scientists, our astronomers and physicists, and all the other disciplines, suspected for many kronos that there was intelligent life in the universe. Other than here in Tharn. But all efforts of communication failed and after a time it hardly seemed worth while. We had domestic problems, also. We became a one crop economy. Mani. To produce enough mani for all our needs we had to control the weather, and the sky, and so shut ourselves off from the universe. But we know it is there, Lord. We know it is there!" And Sutha smiled.
"I," said Blade, "am living proof of that." Sutha was speaking again. "In a sense, you are Mazda! HE WHO COMES TO THEY. We shall accept you as such, Richard Blade. I will call you that in private. And though we know, you and I and Isma, that you are not a God, yet it may well be that you are sent to save Tharn. Now to business. You will find that we in Urcit, as apart from certain other parts of Tharn, are an eminently practical people."
Blade asked the question that had been bothering him.
"You speak always and only of Isma. What of Astar? In the books I have read..."
Sutha held up a hand. "Yes. You have a right to know. Our religion is based on duality and as Mazda you will have to consort with both of them. Astar represents power, Isma death. So it is written and so it has to be, for all power structures need a religion. But in Tharn, Isma must carry the whole burden. Astar is a child. Has been a child since birth. Her brain did not develop as it should have. She is capable of going through the outward motions of being Astar, no more. Now, about this neuter in the North Provo. Honcho?"
"That is the name I know him by."
"It is enough. I will show you a picture. You will tell me if it is a likeness of the neuter Honcho."
Sutha pressed one of the many switches set into the flat wall. An image leaped into being on the screen. It was Honcho, his arms folded, his green eyes staring out into the room. Below the picture was a medallion bearing an inscription.
Honcho. Kronos 4006, Tier 1, Decantment 1. Destruct Kronos 800.
Below the medallion, in cursive Tharnian, someone had scrawled with a stylus: 14th Level...?...investigate.
Sutha looked at Blade. "That is the neuter?"
"Yes."
Sutha pressed another switch and the picture faded.
"We have suspected Honcho for some time," Sutha said. "We could never be quite sure. He is very clever and has always been able to conceal his true intelligence, which is far above the 14th level. We knew there was an abort in the 4006 group, but we have never been able to find it. Now we know for sure."
Blade said: "He has one great weakness. Sex. What you people call coi. I have told you about Totha. It is possible that she will destroy Honcho for us. I tried to arrange it so."
Sutha shook his head. "That would not be good. We prefer that Honcho remain alive, and that he lead the Pethcines into Tharn. We plan to destroy them once and for all, forever. This we cannot do unless we can entice them out of the Gorge. Our powers are of no avail in the Gorge. I hope that this woman, this Totha, will fail. I consider it likely that she will. Honcho is far too intelligent to be destroyed by a woman."
Blade' kept silent. He was not sure, knowing Totha. And this old Sutha had not seen the torment in Honcho's eyes when he spoke of sex. Coi. This was one department, Blade thought, in which he knew more than the Tharnians. And Sutha, as a neuter, could not begin to understand.
Sutha's next words shattered that illusion.
"I was also an abort," said the old neuter. "Something went wrong in my conditioning and decanting process and I was given intelligence far above my station. I am very nearly homid, as Honcho must be. I understand the torture of coi when one is not equipped for coi. I feel sympathy for this Honcho. Still, he must be destroyed, after he has served his purpose and led the Pethcines into the trap that we shall lay for them."
Blade was slightly awe-stricken. The old neuter might have been looking into his mind.
Now Isma interrupted for the first time. Her voice came into the room. "You have talked enough for now, Sutha. I would speak with Mazda, with Blade, in person. See that his comforts are attended to, that he has everything he wishes, then send him to me. Alone in the Sacred Chamber. No one must know, of course. If he is to be Mazda the exact letter of the prophecy must be followed."
Sutha shook his head and held up a hand. Isma could see them, then? Blade had been on the verge of producing the little cylinder he had taken from Zulekia's body. Now he did not.
Sutha was still shaking his head. "In all respect and obedience, Isma, I wish that you would not. It would be a violation of the Book. Neither you nor Astar should see him until the Ceremony of Ravishment. It is so written and I think it should so be. Tharn is in peril, Isma. Even though you may not believe it. Tharn is and will be, in great peril. I make all humble slaveface, as any neuter must, but I ask you, High Priestess, to trust me in this matter. Wait!"
Silence. Then Isma said a word that Blade did not understand. But he understood the tone, the disappointment. More silence and an emptiness in the room that had been missing before.
Sutha shrugged. "She does not listen now. She is angry with me and you. No matter. She will get over it. She is only impatient for a real man at last, and who can blame her? But there are more important things at the moment, at least for neuters and would-be Mazdas."
Sutha's smile was open and lacking in deceit. He seemed to be saying that he and Blade were partners now and must somehow muddle through together, but it was not going to be easy.
Blade took the little cylinder from his tunic. He rolled it between his fingers, feeling the raised inscription on it. It was much too fine for him to read with the naked eye. He held it up for the old neuter to see.
That it meant something to Sutha was immediately apparent. The green eyes snapped and he extended a withered hand. "Where did you come by this, Blade? There is something you have not told me, then?"
Blade handed over the cylinder. It was true. He had left Zulekia out of his account. It occurred to him that doing so was a holdover from his other life, had to do with privacy and chivalry, and might very well prove fatal in Tharn. He now told Sutha everything about his relations with the Maiduke girl.
Sutha listened while he scrutinized the little cylinder with a magnifying glass. He kept nodding and chuckling as Blade spoke. Finally he put the cylinder away and smiled at Blade.
"I sent Zulekia to the Provo of North Gorge. To Honcho's territory. As a spy. I did not, of course, know about you then. And that you would confirm my suspicions of Honcho. I had not heard from her. I am relieved to know that she is still alive. Much more so to see that she, in turn, confirms all that you have told me about yourself and your relations with Honcho. It clears the air, so to speak."
He seemed prepared to let the matter drop, but Blade would not have it. That last near embrace with Zulekia, the look in those large violet eyes still haunted him.
"Zulekia told me that she had been sent to the Gorge Tower to be punished. That she had committed a crime. Karno! She had been caught in coi with one of the Lordsmen. This is not true, then?"
The old neuter appeared puzzled. He narrowed his eyes at Blade. "But of course it is true. She did commit karno. Her chastity seal was broken! She was sent to the Gorge Tower to be punished: to be given to the ceboids and then flung into the Gorge. Nothing of that has changed. It will still be done. Why are you so concerned, Blade?"
The big man realized, once more, how much he had to learn about the manner of Tharnian thought.
"But she is spying for you, Sutha! Working for you. Surely you promised to commute her sentence, to save her, if she did the job you wanted done?"
Sutha shook his head. "I promised her nothing. Why should I? She has sinned and must pay for it anyway. I needed a spy near Honcho. It was a perfect, a valid, excuse to do what I had to do. Simple. What is it that you do not understand?"
"Why she obeyed, why she worked so well for you if you did not promise her anything. If she has nothing to gain. But then perhaps she is depending on your mercy?"
"Mercy?" Sutha repeated the word, frowning. "I do not think I understand. It is not Tharnian. What does it mean?"
Blade hesitated, then tried another tack. He was in Tharn! Think and do and speak as the Tharnians did. But how to make Sutha understand? Sex without love. Autocracy and obedience without mercy!
He tried bluntness. "I would have this girl, Zulekia, saved. I had coi with her, as I told you, and I liked it very much. I want it again. With Zulekia. I wish her saved and brought back to Urcit."
Sutha raised a hand in warning. There was a glint of terror in his eyes. Blade waited. The neuter stared around the room, listening, waiting for something. He put a trembling finger to his lips and with the other hand kept waving Blade to silence.
Nothing. Blade guessed that Isma had kept her word. Angry with both of them, pouting, she had shut off communication.
Sutha stood up and beckoned to Blade, still with his finger at his lips. Blade followed him. They left the chamber through the narrow postern in the screen.
They were in a long room that stretched away as far as Blade could see. It was empty but for row upon row of computers clacking and humming away. They were all made of teksin, large and small, and their sound was as ominous as a flight of giant bees. Acre upon acre of them spinning and clicking and flashing.
Sutha blinked his narrow eyes at Blade. He waved a hand at the vast and serried rows of computers and in a loud voice, and bunking another warning, he said: "This is the central control room of all of Tharn. All orders, directives, codes physical and moral, regulations and decisions, everything to do with running Tharn, it all emanates from here. I do not say that power originates here. Come, I will show you where it does originate."
His eyes were still enjoining silence. Blade said nothing, but his impatience was growing and his temper fraying. He knew himself and he knew his trouble. He was afraid, but not afraid enough. K his temper got off the leash he could wreck everything. He fought it.
They left the. maze of computers and went down stairs that were broad and shallow. They seemed endless, but at last they came to a short hall leading to tall double doors. Over the doors was the symbol of the phallus.
Sutha, still speaking loudly, said, "As Mazda it is fitting, Lord, that you be shown the Power Pool at once. It was given by you, and to you we now return it. It is the source of all things and I know that you and Isma will use it wisely." The green eyes went blink-blink-blink.
They halted. Sutha put out a hand. The huge doors swung slowly open. Blade shifted the great sword at his side. The baldric was too narrow and at times galled his shoulder.
They advanced into a gloomy cavernous chamber. The phallic symbols were everywhere. In the exact center of the chamber was a circular pool of water. Near it was a long altar, built so low that they could look down into the open sarcophagus.
She might have been sleeping. She was naked except for a single strip of golden teksin covering the pubic area. Her long hair fell over her shoulders and partially hid her firm upthrust breasts with a fine veil of tawny gold. Her eyes were closed and there was a faint smile on the scarlet lips. It was the dual face of Astar and Isma. Her flesh was copper-gold tinted, the legs so long and sensually curving, so rounded and pneumatic and firm with life that it did not seem possible that she was dead.
"The first Queen-Goddess," said Sutha. "Astar I. She has been dead for many millions of kronos. Yet she lives. She will live as long as Tharn lives. And Tharn will live as long as she lives."
Blade stepped back to watch as the old neuter made obeisance before the sarcophagus. He sensed that in this the neuter was sincere. His face, his voice and gestures, were solemn and deeply felt. Cynic, skeptic, Tharnian sophisticate to the core, yet this sexless thing was worshiping this long dead corpse. It was eerie and Blade did not try to deny the prickle of near fear, and awe, that plucked at his nerves.
The long dead Queen-Goddess lay in eternal silence. In her right hand was clutched the phallus staff. Sutha was still on his knees. The silence in the chamber was absolute.
Sutha arose, his manner suddenly brisk. He beckoned to Blade. "Come here. I will show you the Power Pool. In this place it is safe to speak our true minds.
The only place in all Tharn. Here, in the Sacred of Sacreds, there are no eyes or ears except our own."
"And who has admission to this place?" asked Blade as he followed Sutha around the sarcophagus to the circular pool.
"Only three. Until you came. Astar, Isma, and myself. And now you." Sutha flicked a quick smile at Blade. "You see? I give the fate of Tharn into your hands. As Honcho would have it."
They halted at the edge of the little pool. It was. Blade judged, some twelve feet in diameter and the surface was unriffled, smooth as glass, dead and stagnant-looking as if nothing had disturbed it in centuries. Blade peered down into the crystalline depths. It was deep. How deep he could not guess.
By his side Sutha spoke quietly. "What do you see, Blade?"
He saw a squarish, small, casket-like box. It lay glimmering on the bottom of the pool. There was no motion, no refulgence in the water, nothing to indicate the awesome power that Blade knew was contained in the box.
"This is the Pool," said Sutha. As though he were entoning a litany. "This is the Pool and that is the Source of all things. In that small casket is the Power!"
Some form of nuclear power, thought Blade, who was no scientist. The Tharnian version of atomic exploitation. Far more sophisticated than anything he knew about. And yet there must be more to it, infinite and complex refinements.
Sutha was reading his thoughts. "It is the Power, but in itself it does not do the work of Tharn. We use the Power to dislocate and harness the magnetic fields. Do you understand these matters, Blade?"
Blade shrugged his huge shoulders. "Not much of it," he said gruffly. "I am a warrior. A man of arms! What should I know of such things?"
Sutha was watching Blade closely. Blade smiled. "What happens?", be pointed down into the pool, "what happens if it is disturbed? Touched. Moved?"
The neuter spread his hand in a gesture of effacement. "I cannot say. In millions of kronos it has never been disturbed. I can only tell you what is written. What is in the Book. If the Power is in any way defiled it will first destroy he who defiles it, then it will die. The Power will no longer exist! If that ever happens then Tharn will no longer exist."
Blade was silent for a long time, staring down at the bottom of the pool.
"Clever Honcho," he said at last. "Cunning Honcho. If I had obeyed him I would have destroyed myself and Tharn at the same time. You would have been powerless, Sutha, in a very real sense."
"It is so," agreed Sutha. "And Honcho could have led his Pethcines up from the Gorge to destroy us all."
Silence. Blade shifted the heavy sword again. He pulled it half out of the scabbard, then slammed it back. He looked at the frail old neuter.
"I could still do it."
Sutha smiled. "You could, Blade. I am frail and weak and very old. Neuters cannot fight I could not prevent you. Here we are entirely private and no help will come. But are you so bent on self-destruction, Blade? And you would serve Honcho that far?"
Blade swore. "I am going to take great pleasure in killing Honcho when the time comes. I hope it will be soon."
There was a ledge of teksin brick rimming the pool. Now Sutha seated himself on it and crossed his thin legs. Blade fancied he detected a quirk of merriment in the old green eyes. And acknowledged that he was beginning to like, really like, this old man. In that instant Blade perceived something he had never really known before, had not even thought much about. It did not take only sex to make a man!
"It will be soon," said Sutha. "The sooner the better. But we must plan it carefully. You must follow, to the letter and all but the sabotage of the Power, the plan that Honcho laid out for you. But we will discuss that later, when Isma is with us. She will have to know. Now, in private and in safety - and we cannot come here too often or Isma will suspect - what is this nonsense about the Maiduke girl, Zulekia? Are all the men mad in this place from whence you came?"
Blade nearly laughed. "Not mad, Sutha. Stubborn, perhaps. But I liked Zulekia. It is as simple as that. I liked and enjoyed her. I would not have, her harmed. Surely, with all your powers, it is not so difficult to save her?"
Sutha looked pained. "I pray Astar you are not a simpleton, Blade. All my hopes and plans are useless if you are. But I will assume that you are not and that you can understand matters if I explain it properly. So pay careful attention."
Sutha held up one finger. "I cannot understand, possibly because I am a neuter, what is so important about one Maiduke girl who was born and conditioned only to obey and be destroyed when her time comes. Especially one who has committed the crime of karno and deserves to be destroyed. I cannot understand it, but I will accept it as your true wish."
Blade nodded. "It is."
Sutha held up a second finger. "Agreed. Now, Zulekia is in the Gorge Tower, Honcho's prisoner, and so beyond my power to save or harm at the moment."
"I find that hard to believe," said Blade. He frowned and pointed down into the pool. "You have the Power!"
Sutha scowled. It was obvious that he was being very patient with Blade.
"I have the Power. Yes. Am I to use it then, to destroy Honcho and rescue a criminal girl at the cost of forsaking my major and important plan? The total destruction of the Pethcines?"
Blade grudgingly admitted that this would not be wise.
"Besides," said Sutha in a musing tone, "I am not so sure that I can destroy Honcho as long as he remains in his own Provo. He is cunning and also something of a genius. Look at the way he sent your mind, your intelligence only, to scout Urcit! We here know of this, in theory, but we have not yet perfected it Above all Honcho must not be underestimated."
It was ridiculous and Blade knew it, but nevertheless he found himself glancing around the Sacred Chamber. "Is there any chance...?"
Sutha shook his head. "Not now. As soon as you told me it was recorded on magamp steps were taken. No. Honcho cannot send his mind into Urcit now."
"But that is a giveaway in itself, Sutha. Honcho will know, or suspect, that I have told you everything."
The old neuter held up a soothing hand. "Perhaps not. We are always experimenting with various types of powers of magveils. Maybe he will attribute it to that And, when we are ready, we will let his mind through. Or, better yet, his simlu. When we are ready, not before.
"In the meantime, Blade, you must see that nothing can be done about Zulekia. If I save the girl and destroy Honcho too soon, I will lose the Pethcines. I cannot destroy them in the Gorge. If I shut off all power, here at the source, and I can do that, then I deprive Honcho of power but I also leave Urcit defenseless. The Pethcines can invade us and Honcho wins his end in any case. Must you have this one girl, Blade?"
Blade thought for a moment. Then: "I must have her. Or, at least, I must save her. I will not have her destroyed, used by the ceboids and thrown into the Gorge. If she must die I would have it done in a more humane manner. She is not a ceboid or a...a..."
Sutha stared at Blade. The green eyes were cool, but without anger.
"Or a neuter?"
Blade cursed his blundering tongue, but he plunged ahead. "All right. She is homid. Human. And I like her. And I pity her. That is another word you do not use in Tharn. I beg you, Sutha, do what you can!"
Sutha rubbed his nose with a long forefinger. "There is still another word that we do not use. Very few know it. Only old ones like me, that read the mysteries that no one else ever reads or even knows exist. It is also a forbidden word and it is mentioned only once in all the mysteries. It is an odd word. Love. Does it mean anything to you, Blade?"
Something bade Blade shake his head and deny. "No. I do not know the word."