handled properly—the end of the Soviet empire and a return of Western industry
and commerce to a position of undisputed worldwide leadership, which means a lot
of people would stand to get very rich. What’s in it for you, Zambendorf, is
that you can reserve yourself a place in the club—a very special club. Whatever
you were aiming at before in life doesn’t matter anymore. This is it—the
bonanza; the real big time.”
“And how about the rest of the Taloids?” Zambendorf asked. “What happens to them
in all this?”
Giraud frowned and looked surprised. “Their situation would be no different from
what it’s always been …”
“Exploited by their own leaders,” Zambendorf supplied. “Serfs in a feudal order
that gives them no opportunity for development. Kept in ignorance deliberately
and fed superstition because education would be incompatible with unquestioning
obedience and the domination by fear upon which the system depends. Is that what
you wish to perpetuate?”
“What kind of talk is this?” Leaherney asked, sounding irritable suddenly.
“Hell, they’re only machines after all. You’re making them sound almost human.”
Zambendorf stared down at his cup for a long time. That was the whole point—the
Taloids were human. He didn’t quite know how, but he could sense it every time
he talked with them. The phrases that appeared on the transmogrifier screen
might have been crude and semicoherent, but that was a reflection of a
restricted communications medium, not of the beings at whom the communications
were directed. The clumsy strings of words did not, and could not, convey the
richness and depth of qualities, meanings, feelings, and perceptions which
Zambendorf somehow knew formed the Taloid world as seen through Taloid eyes any
more than they could the human world as seen through human eyes. Both worlds
were illusions created from the raw material of photons, pressure waves, and
other forms of primary sensory stimuli, which were processed into abstract
symbols and assembled via two forms of nervous system, one biochemical, the
other holotronic, into consciously experienced interactions of people, places,
and things. As external realities, the people, the places, and the things
existed only as bare frameworks onto which minds projected covering, form,
warmth, color, and other attributes which the minds themselves created; thus
each mind manufactured its own illusory world upon a minimum of shared reality
to conform to its own set of culturally defined expectations, and in such a way
as to appear satisfyingly real in total to its creator. Zambendorf, the
illusionist, could understand it all clearly. But, he could see just as clearly,
he would never be able to convey what he understood to the three men sitting
with him in the executive lounge of the Orion. “Suppose I decide I don’t want to
get involved with it,” he said at last, looking up at them. “Then what?”
“Is that a decision?” Leaherney asked him.
“No. I’m just curious.”
Lang answered. “We’d manage anyhow, either with your cooperation or without it.
But from your point of view it wouldn’t be too smart. The people who sent you
all this way at considerable expense would be pretty upset about it. And they do
have a lot of influence with the media . . .” Lang shook his head slowly and
clicked his tongue. “You could find it’s the end of the road for you, old buddy.
And that’d be a shame, wouldn’t it?”
25
GOYDEROOCH, HEADROBEING OF THE VILLAGE OF XERXEON, STOOD with Casquedin, the
village prayer and beseecher, in front of a huddle of elders and watched
apprehensively as the column of royal cavalry filed slowly into the square. The
soldiers and their mounts were covered with dust and looked as if they had
ridden from Pergassos without stopping, which indicated that their mission was
urgent. The colors carried by the pennant-bearer were those of the captain,
Horazzorgio, who had passed through Xerxeon over five brights previously in
pursuit ofDornvald the outlaw, Bringer-of-Sky-Dragons. Horazzorgio was missing
an arm and had one eye covered, Goyderooch saw as the lead riders crossed the
square and drew up before him. His synchronizing oscillator missed a pulse.
Perhaps Dornvald’s small band had been the bait to lure the King’s soldiers into