She had ridden out through the phase-shield with one of the Dorsai advisors, like Amanda, who had been returning to the Exotics after a brief, necessary visit to Earth. Hal, at least, had heard nothing of her since.
She had been a waspish, angry woman by nature, very nearly the exact opposite of what other cultures thought of as Exotic. But Hal had appreciated the sincerity and single-mindedness of her point of view, and her sharp-faced, middle-aged image rose again in his mind now as he said her name. It had not struck him until this moment that she might be the one he should come to meet here in this place. "I'll let you find out for yourself," was all Amanda answered. She led him on toward the entrance of the first, and smallest, log building.
However, before they reached it a figure that was not Nonne's but even more familiar to Hal appeared around the edge of the building. Walking beside him was a man as large as Hal. Both wore the penitential robes. But Hal's eyes fastened on the small body and wrinkled face of the smaller of the two, who had been his closest companion during the time when he had been struggling to bring the Exotics to give all they had to the cause now fought for by Earth. " Amid!" he said. "But you're not at the Final Encyclopedia anymore,?"
He corrected himself. "No, of course not," he said. "Forgive me. I've been so out of touch with people this last year, even at the Encyclopedia, that I forget. That's right, about eight months ago one of the advisors from Kultis, here, brought word your brother was sick. You left to go to him, didn't you? But I didn't realize you'd stayed."
A smile energized all the lines in the face of the little man so that he seemed to shine with good humor. "Hal!" he said, hurrying forward to take Hal's hand with both of his own. "I'd hoped - but I didn't really think there was a chance Amanda could bring you here!"
Hal smiled back. It would have been next to impossible not to. "As you see," he answered. "But you found a job to keep you here?" "I'm sorry. Seeing you-" He broke off. "I suppose I ought to explain that Kanin wasn't actually a brother of mine, by blood - the way the word's used on other worlds. In my generation, we still ran to large communal families. But he was as close to me as if he had been, physically, my sibling. Perhaps closer. And I called him brother'. So of course I came back here as soon as I heard. " "And stayed, obviously," said Hal. "Yes." Amid let go of Hal's hand, but continued to beam up at him. "For one thing, he'd died by the time I got here, and I was needed. For another, for a long time I'd been bothered. I was sitting there, safe and useless behind the phase-shield, in the comfort of the Encyclopedia while my people were suffering." "So your brother was one of the people here?" "He was Guildmaster," said Amid. "Now, I am. By default, more or less." "That's not true," said the tall man. "No one could have filled Kanin's shoes, his brother's shoes, but Amid." "I'm sorry," said Amid. "I should have introduced Artur, here. He's Assistant Guildmaster. Artur, you know Amanda. This is Hal Mayne. "
Artur extended a hand and Hal clasped it, feeling from the sudden heartiness of the grasp confirmation of what his instinctive perceptions of emotion in others had already suspected. Artur was an impressive-looking individual, nearly bald, with a narrow waist and massive, smooth-skinned arms and legs showing beyond the short sleeves and the hem of the robe he wore. But he would far rather have been a smaller man.
Hal had been aware that, in the first moment of their seeing each other, Artur had automatically measured himself physically against Hal's size and apparent strength. However, it had been a reflexive, unwilling measurement. Artur was undoubtedly strong, even in proportion to his height and weight, but he apparently was one of those who found the gifts of both size and strength as only crosses to be borne.
Like certain other large men Hal had met, Artur clearly had an unhappiness over the attitudes of those smaller, who assumed that because of his size he did not suffer from their fears, their sensitivities to the pains and dangers of life. He felt that everyone expected him, because of his size, to do more, to endure more, to enjoy what they thought of as an unfair advantage. An advantage he, himself, would happily have foregone if he could only be treated as no different than everyone else.
It was an unhappiness which Hal had been lucky to avoid, largely because of his upbringings, both as Donal and Hal. Also because with the Dorsai, just as physical training and skill could more than compensate for differences in power, they also rendered unimportant any advantages of extra size. Strength, there, was irrelevant, in comparison with the will and soul inside the person - large or small, old or young, man, woman, or child - on whom others might have to depend, and the Dorsai culture took for granted an understanding of this. "Come in. Come in and let's talk!" Amid was saying.
He stood aside to let Amanda go before him and then followed her through the doorway of the small building. Hal was about to follow, when Artur spoke behind him. "Hal Mayne?" "Yes?" Hal turned. " I'm sorry... you're the Hal Mayne, of course. I should have recognized you at once. Amid's talked about you often."
There was embarrassment, but also relief in Artur's voice, and Hal understood. Artur could not be expected by anyone to compete against someone with Hal's reputation. "Recognizing anyone right away from nothing more than verbal descriptions is pretty good," said Hal.
He turned and went in, hearing Artur behind him. Inside, the building seemed almost entirely given over to what appeared to be a single meeting, eating, and working room. The last of the sunset was almost gone behind the rocky peaks almost directly over them, in just these few minutes. But the lingering brightness of the sky still glowed into one side of the large room they had just entered, touching it through a number of the small, square windows spaced evenly around the walls. Interior lighting was just beginning to supplement this.
The artificial light came from a combination of candles, and three of the common, portable, hundred-year lamps, affixed to the rafters which openly crossed the space overhead under the steeply pitched roof.
Solar-charged lamps like these would be left over from before the coming of the Occupation Forces to Kultis, which brought an end to what relatively little manufacturing the two Exotic worlds had done for themselves. In addition, there was an open fireplace, contained within a square of four knee-high walls of reddish brick. There was a hood over it of some metal which looked like, and well might be, copper, undoubtedly likewise salvaged from earlier days on this world. The hood reached up to a chimney pipe of the same metal.
The fire already burning in the fireplace gave little light of its own, but what there was of it softened the rather harsh illumination from the hundred-year lamps, which were originally designed primarily for outdoor and commercial uses.
In the partition wall opposite the door they had just come in were two other doors, both partially open at the moment. One gave a glimpse into a small bed area, and the other, a bathroom. Around the large room were wooden chairs, homemade obviously, but padded and comfortable, and one large table end-on to them, that had its farther end piled with papers.
The four of them moved instinctively toward the chairs closest to the fireplace, for though the sun had been hidden for only a few minutes, it seemed that a chill was already penetrating into the building from the open air beyond the front door. "These are my quarters," said Amid as they sat down, "but I've also got another office in one of the two dormitory buildings, which can double as a bedroom. I'll let you two have that for the night, if you like, since we aren't set up for guests in the ordinary way of things. But sit down, sit down! You've come just at dinner time. Will you eat with me?" "We'd be glad to," Amanda said. Artur got up again, hastily. "I'll take care of it," he said, and went out. "He's a good Assistant Guildmaster," said Amid, as the door closed behind the big man. "If I hadn't had him to help me take charge here, I don't think I could have managed." "Do you mind if I ask why you did take over?" Hal asked. "I can see you staying, for the reasons you gave a moment ago. But why take on the job of Guildmaster?" "I was drafted into it, in a manner of speaking," said Amid. "Those who'd known Kanin wanted me simply because I'd been his brother. They seemed to think there was something in common between us that fitted the job. And, to tell you the truth, I did know something of how Kanin thought in many ways. Even though we hadn't seen each other for fifteen years. I flattered myself my decisions would be his decisions. Because he made this place work. He didn't found it, you understand - or has Amanda told you all about the Chantry Guild already?" "I've told him nothing," said Amanda. "I see." Amid looked at Hal. His lined old face was shrewd. "Why did you come, Hal?" "Because Amanda said it was something I should do. She was right," said Hal.