"You’ve heard my explanation of how the world works," he said, his throat aching from unaccustomed shouting. "We are a moon that revolves around a planet which we call the Face of God, and that planet, like all the others, travels in a circular path around our sun."
"Behold!" screamed a voice. "The lies of Larsk revealed!" The speaker sounded close to madness. The crowd was nearing a fever pitch.
"But hear, now, the most important message of all!" Afsan dared raise both hands, briefly letting go of the shovelmouth’s neck. "Our world is doomed!"
"Just as it was foretold!" shouted a drawn-out voice that sounded like Cadool’s.
Afsan heard a buzz move through the crowd. "We have some time yet," he shouted. "Although the world’s fate is sealed, we have many kilodays before its end will come."
"Kilodays to pray!" said another voice.
"No!" Afsan again balanced on the shovelmouth’s back, holding both hands aloft. "No! Kilodays to prepare! We must get off this world."
The sounds from the crowd were of puzzlement now.
"Get off the world?"
"What does he mean?"
Afsan wished he could see them, wished he could read their faces. Was he getting through to any of them?
"I mean," he said, "that although the world is ending, our race does not have to. We can leave this place, fly to somewhere else."
"Fly?" The word echoed throughout the square in intonations ranging from puzzled to sarcastic.
"Yes, fly! In vessels — ships — like those in which we now ply the waters of this world."
"We don’t know how to do that," called a voice.
"And I don’t know, either," said Afsan. "But we must find a method — we must! It will mean changing the way in which we conduct our lives. We must give ourselves over to science, we must learn all that we can. Wingfingers fly; insects fly. If they can do it, we can do it. It’s only a question of discovering their methods and adapting them to our needs. Science holds our answer; knowledge — real knowledge, verifiable knowledge, not superstition, not religious nonsense — will be our salvation."
The crowd, at last, was silent, save for the grunts of the beasts.
"We must learn to work together, to cooperate." He smelled their pheromones, knew they were confused. "Nature — or God — has given us a great challenge. We have trouble working side by side; our territorial instincts drive us apart. But we must overcome these instincts, be creatures of reason and sanity instead of prisoners of our biology."
Afsan turned his head in small increments from left to right, as if looking at each individual face. He could hear the hiss of conversation growing, a comment here, a question there, a remark from the back, an interjection up front.
"But, Afsan," came a voice, louder than the others, "we need our territories…"
Afsan held the shovelmouth’s neck firmly so as not to lose his balance as he tipped forward in a concessional bow. "Of course we do," he said. "But once we leave this world, there will be room for us all. Our Land is but a tiny part of the vast universe. We’re going to the stars!"
Suddenly another voice cut across all the others, a voice amplified and reverberating through a speaking horn.
"This is Det-Yenalb, Master of the Faith. Disperse at once. I have assembled those loyal to the Emperor and they are prepared to move upon the square unless you leave now. I say again: This is Det-Yenalb…"
The fool! Afsan felt pheromones from the crowd wash over him like a wave. His own claws extended. The shovelmouth gave a little yelp as their points dug into its neck. He could hear bodies jostling as Quintaglios, already packed too tightly, turned to face the priest. The situation was explosive.
"What are you afraid of, Yenalb?" shouted Afsan.
"Disperse!"
"What are you afraid of?" echoed the crowd of hunters.
Yenalb’s voice reverberated back. "I fear for your souls."
"And I fear for the survival of our people," Afsan shouted. "Call off your supporters, Yenalb. Do you really want to send priests, academics, and ceremonial guards against the finest hunters in all of Land? Retreat, before it’s too late!"
"I say again," said Yenalb. "Disperse. No punishment will be levied if you leave now."
Cadool’s voice rose up, almost deafening Afsan. "Upon whose authority do you act, priest?"
Echoing, reverberating: "The authority of His Luminance Dy-Dybo, Emperor of the eight provinces and the Fifty Packs."
"And how," demanded Cadool, "did fat Dybo come upon his authority?"
"He is…" Yenalb halted, the final syllable repeating as it faded away. But the crowd knew what he had intended to say. He is the descendant of Larsk.
"Larsk is a false prophet," yelled a female voice, "and Dybo’s authority is unearned."
Shouts of agreement went up throughout the square.
"You will disperse!" said Yenalb.
"No," said Afsan, his voice cutting through the uproar. "We will not. Order your people to withdraw."
They waited for Yenalb’s response, but there was none.
"Once first blood is spilled, Yenalb, there will be no stopping an escalation." Afsan’s voice was going, his throat raw. "You know that. Order the retreat."
Yenalb’s voice echoed back, but it had a different tone. He must have turned around to address those who were loyal to the palace. "Advance!" shouted the priest. "Clear the square!"
For once, Afsan was glad he could not see.
*35*
Pal-Cadool looked up at Afsan, balanced atop the tube-crested shoveler. The One, still small and always scrawny, had eyelids closed over rent orbs. His voice, unaccustomed to addressing multitudes, had become strained.
Cadool then looked out across the square. The Lubalites filled most of the eastern side. Some were atop hornfaces, half hidden behind the great bony neck frills. Others were riding running beasts, both the green and the beige variety. Still others were on shovelmouths — hardly a fighting creature, but still a good mount. And a few hunters stood on the wide knobby carapaces of armorbacks, ornery plant-eaters mostly encased in bone.
But Cadool saw that the bulk of the five hundred hunters were on foot. They had been rapt with attention, drinking in the words of Sal-Afsan, The One.
But now those loyal to the Emperor, led by Del-Yenalb high on the back of a spikefrill, were moving into the square through the Arch of the First Emperor.
The hunters turned, those on foot swinging quickly around, those riding atop great reptiles prodding their beasts to rotate through a half circle. With grunts and hisses the animals obeyed.
Cadool guessed there were seventy paces between the two forces. On this side, 500 hunters. On Yenalb’s, perhaps 120 priests, scholars, and palace staff members, each atop an imperial mount.
The palace loyal were a sorry lot: many of them had lived soft lives, relying on butchers such as Cadool himself to do their hunting and killing. No, they were no match for the Lubalites, either in number or skill. But their mounts were fresh, not exhausted from the long march to Capital City. Cadool took a moment to size up the animals they rode. Armorbacks had daggers of bone coming off the sides of their thick carapaces and had solid clubs at the ends of their muscular tails. A hunter would never use such a club in battle, but scholars and priests might indeed sink so low. One swing from an armorback’s tail could stave in a Quintaglio skull.
And then there were the hornfaces, with three pointed shafts of bone protruding from the fronts of their skulls: a long one from above each eye and another, shorter horn rising from the tip of the muzzle. In his time, Cadool had seen many hunters, either too daring or too careless, gored by such beasts. Even Dem-Pironto, who, excepting Afsan, was the finest hunter Cadool had ever known, had been felled that way. Further, the great neck shields, rising like walls of bone from the back of the animals’ skulls, would help protect the scholars and priests.