Helliconia Summer - Brian W. Aldiss [456]
When T’Sehn-Hrr sailed away, no human being had witnessed the event. Cosmologists on the Avernus and on Earth had reconstructed the event, and believed they understood it. In the great disruptions which had overtaken the system eight million Earth years previously, the gravitational forces of the star now called Freyr, with a mass 14.8 times that of the Sun, had wrenched T’Sehn-Hrr away from Helliconia’s pull.
Calculations indicated that T’Sehn-Hrr had a radius of 1252 km, against Helliconia’s 7723 km. Whether the satellite had been capable of supporting life was doubtful.
What was certain was that the events of that epoch had been so near catastrophic that they had remained etched in the eotemporal minds of the phagors. The sky had fallen in and no one had forgotten it.
More impressive to human minds was the way in which life on Helliconia had survived even the loss of its moon and the cosmohgical events which had caused that loss.
‘Yes, I know. This sounds like sacrilege and I am sorry,’ shouted Sartorilrvrash, as Odi moved close to him and the noise grew. ‘What is true should be said – and heard. Phagors were once the dominant race and will become so again if allowed to live. The experiments I conducted show, I believe, that we were animals. Genethlic divinities bred mankind from Others – Others who were ancipital pets before the upheaval. Mankind developed from Others as phagors developed from flambreg. As phagors developed from flambreg, they may again cover the earth one day. They are still waiting, wild, with kaidaws, in the High Nktryhk, to descend in vengeance. They will wipe you out. Be warned then. Increase the drumbles. Intensify them. Ancipitals must be wiped out in the summer, when mankind is strong. When winter comes, the wild kaidaws return!
‘My final word to you: We must not waste energy fighting each other. We should fight the older enemy – and those humans who protect them!’
But the humans were already fighting each other. The most religious members of the audience were often those, like Crispan Mornu, who were most in favour of drumbles. Here was an outsider offending their deepest religious principles, yet encouraging their violent instincts. The first one to throw a stone was attacked by his neighbour. Missiles were flying all over the garden. Soon the first dagger bit into flesh. A man ran among the flower beds, bleeding, and fell on his face. Women screamed. Fighting became more general as tempers and fears mounted. The awning collapsed.
As Alam Esomberr quietly left the scene, a miniature history of warfare was enacted on the palace lawn.
The chief cause of the commotion looked on aghast. It was beyond belief how people responded to scholarship. Holy idiots! A flying stone caught him in the mouth, and he collapsed.
Odi Jeseratabhar threw herself on SartoriIrvrash, crying and trying to ward off more stones.
She was dragged aside by a group of young monks, who punched her and then began to beat and kick the prostrate ex-chancellor. They at least refused to hear the name of Akhanaba defiled.
Crispan Mornu, in fear that matters were getting so out of hand, stepped forward and raised his arms, opening the black wings of his keedrant. It was slashed by a sword blade. Odi turned and ran; her garments were seized by a woman as she passed, and next moment she was struggling for her life amid a dozen angry women.
The clamour grew, a clamour that before the hour was out would spread into the city. Indeed the monks themselves spread the clamour. Before very long, they emerged bloodstained from the precincts of the palace, bearing above their heads the broken corpses of SartoriIrvrash and his Sibornalese companion, screaming as they went, ‘Blasphemy is dead! Long live Akhanaba!’
After the fighting in the gardens, there was a rush to the streets, and more scuffles there, while the dead bodies were paraded down Wozen