Again Dagny’s focus drifted. Her Lunarian children were not altogether sundered from her. Anson/ Brandir told of mighty works to be wrought, and for Sigurd/Kaino shipyards were among them, spaceships for him and his kind …
“—most notorious case, in the Cordillera range. Pursuant to the governor general’s declared policy, every effort was made to reach agreement.” At least Sundaram did not cite those back-and-forth, multiply connecting calls and faxes, the pussyfooting, the bluster, the queries, the evasions, the temporizing, the thunderheads piling high with lightning in their caverns—but no, that was a wrong figure for these lands which had never known a wind … “—at last ordered a mission to the area in dispute.”
Abruptly the scene was there, pockmarked bare hills rising toward mountains dappled and gashed by shadows. The camera, inside one of two large vans, swung about until it looked back east. Earth stood at the waning quarter just above yonder horizon. The sun blazed at mid-morning. A road, little more than regolith smoothed and roughly graded, wound up over the kilometers toward this halting place. The camera swept through a half circle and came to rest, scanning out the front of its vehicle. The road went on until lost to sight amidst ruggedness. Here, though, an arch made of native rock bestrode it, filled by a gate of steel bars, shut. Dagny well remembered that portal. Brandir had taken her and Edmond through it when he showed them his realm and what he was building there.
That was four years ago. Since then the newscasts had now and then replayed satellite pictures. Like others on Luna, the complex grew swiftly and greatly. Its inhabitants and workers said very little about their doings within. Brandir’s parents had learned not to ask him.
Four spacesuited forms stood before the gate. Slung at their shoulders, jutting above the lifepacks, were things with tubes. Behind the bars waited the car that had brought them, a moondodger, fast and agile.
The camera zoomed in on their helmeted heads. Three were unknown to Dagny. One was a man of her kind, bald, stocky, tough. Two were young, male and female, unmistakable metamorphs—Lunarians. The fourth, the leader, was her Kaino. His unruly red hair shouted against the dun rockscape.
“Greeting,” came Sundaram’s voice, machine-rendered into English. He identified himself. “I am in command of the inspection team you have been notified to expect.”
“You were detected afar.” Kaino’s own English did
POUL ANDERSON
not ordinarily bear this strong an intonation of the language his breed used among themselves. “Greeting, and may your homefaring go well.”
Another camera had been aimed at Sundaram in the control cabin of his vehicle. The presentation split in two, he on the left side of the screen, the Selenites on the right. Mostly the center of the latter was on Kaino, but sometimes it moved across his companions, as if to catch them in any sinful action. The two Lunarians poised panther-quiet, the terrestroid human shifted from foot to foot and scowled. Kaino himself gestured while he talked, as was his wont.
“Thank you,” the colonel said stiffly. “I take it you will conduct us to the settlement. Shall we proceed?”
“Nay, we have but come to warn you against continuing.”
“What?” Dagny suspected Sundaram registered more surprise than he felt.
“As you must know from highview, presently this road tunnels, dividing into several before any of them emerge. Belike you would lose the proper route.”
“Not if we follow you.”
Kaino grinned. “Ah, but you shall not. I said we came to give you a cautioning. Now we will turn about.” He shrugged in the Earth manner. “\bu can drive around this gate, yes. It is a mere boundary marker. But you cannot match our speed.”
“So you refuse to guide us?”
“We do, either to Zamok Vysoki or through it.” The castle that was arising yonder was already spectacular, but Dagny knew that it must be the iceberg-tip of underground hugenesses, and they shielded against instruments.
“This is the constabulary of the Lunar Authority.”
“And this is the domain of the lord Brandir and the lady Ivala, and I am his brother who speaks for them.”