Faith Read online

“Would any rational system deliberately inject a disease into itself? Nine is all the Commonwealth could possibly take. They were conceived in back alleys, built in secret, launched almost in guilt, and commissioned without ceremonies. They’re even named after ancient killers and loners and assassins: Sirhan, James Earl Ray, Charles Manson. They’re like some shameful medical condition. And yet they’re the only Commonwealth ships which might defeat Her.”

  “And the only time,” Ninth Voice said quietly, “the only time an Outsider has ever faced Her was here, in our system. And you turned away.”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t you think it’s time you told us how you remember that engagement? Not statements or recordings, but how you remember it.”

  “I remember when I first saw Her. It’s true what they say, it’s not like seeing pictures of Her. When She unshrouds, there’s something about Her actual presence which you don’t forget.

  “She’s a bit smaller than an Outsider, but a very similar shape, a thin silver delta. But on Her, the shape looks different. Like She’s only the visible part of something larger.

  “I remember seeing Her pick off the others one by one. It was obscene; they didn’t have a chance.

  “I remember requesting the Cromwell, again and again, to withdraw that ridiculous task force and let me engage Her alone. All my requests were refused, and all of them are on record.

  “I remember thinking that She could have destroyed those cruisers, but She only disabled them. There were casualties, but there were also survivors.

  “I remember how She kept probes on the Sirhan all through the engagement. She made no move against us, and we made none against Her, but Her probes were on us all the time, and they were much stronger than ours on Her. Ours gave us nothing.

  “And I remember the Thomas Cromwell, because that’s where the end came. The Cromwell tried to keep Her at long range and use its beam weapons, but She turned suddenly, in Her own length, and charged down its throat in less than a nanosecond, too quickly for the Cromwell’s electronics to refocus. That’s the first time I’ve seen a ship do something in battle which was both pure reason and pure impulse. It was done so suddenly that it even outpaced computers. It looked instinctive; yet logically it was perfect, and She executed it perfectly.

  “I remember one other thing. She could have used Her own beams and vaporised the Cromwell, but instead She used conventional closeup weapons. Again, She left survivors. I don’t know if that was intentional. I don’t know Her motives. Nobody does. She never communicates.”

  “So, Commander, we’ve come to the point where you turned away.”

  “Yes, I turned away. I took survivors off the Cromwell rather than chase Her, because I knew…”

  “A moment, Commander. You say She was heading here, and you didn’t chase Her?”

  “Yes. I knew She’d never attacked civilian targets. And I knew there were people on the Cromwell I could save. Even knowing what She did to your city, I’d still do the same.”

  Ansah remembered how, on the Bridge of the Sirhan, She was first registered by the scanners: blips and echoes and simulations denoting a single ship of similar dimensions to the Sirhan. And then She unshrouded.

  Ansah had watched in disbelief as She moved among them like a living thing, the way Ansah always imagined the Sirhan appeared in comparison to ordinary ships. Faith made even the Sirhan look like an ordinary ship. She looked like She belonged in empty space; like She was actually a part of empty space, a small part made solid and visible. And the rest looming around Her, unseen.

  There were low chimes from a gold carriage clock on the long table. It was well into evening. During the pause, and in view of the unexpectedly late hour, tea was served. The silence refocused to a muted clatter of porcelain and silver among the indistinct figures at the long curved table. Even in here, the smell of faeces persisted round the edges.

  “Thank you, Commander,” the Chairman said. “I think none of us realised how late it was. The Court is adjourned until tomorrow morning.”

  The trial wore on for another few days, but that was its last substantive chapter. There came an afternoon, seven days later, when all depositions and statements had been read and considered, all recordings of the engagement played and studied, all theories of Faith’s nature and origin weighed, and all matters of Ansah’s record and conduct assessed; and the Chairman found himself ready to bring the trial to a close.

  “Commander Ansah.”

  She stood and faced him. The Chairman studied her through the gathering twilight as Isis set over De Vere, turning the air velvet. She was a beautiful woman, tall and elegant. She was Commander of an Outsider, and he knew she had done terrible things; he’d seen them in her record. Yet she wasn’t unlikeable; even here, at her trial, she had shown glimpses of a self-mocking sense of humour. How had she found time in her life, which wouldn’t last much longer, for such a career? And how could she have done those things?

  “Commander Ansah, these proceedings are concluded. The Court will adjourn to consider its verdict on the two charges against you: Cowardice and Desertion.”

  He realised, only after he said it, that the final words he would speak to her in these proceedings, the final words on the transcript until the announcement of the verdict, would be Cowardice and Desertion.

  The Chairman felt a mounting unease. He knew that an injustice was going to be done, but he genuinely didn’t see how to make it right; and even the injustice would have some trace elements of justice. Nothing was simple.

  The outcome was inevitable, like the fate of those five Isis ships; she knew that. But there was something he still might do for her.

  “Ebele Ansah, please stand. The Court has now reached its verdict,” the Chairman told her, three days later. “On the charge of Cowardice we find you Not Guilty. Unanimously. On the charge of Desertion we find you Guilty. Eleven votes to one.”

  Ansah gazed back at him, without any visible emotion.

  This was what the Chairman had done for her. For three days he had argued against the Cowardice charge, insisting they find her Not Guilty. Their opposition was furious, but he would not be moved. Sensing his mood, some of them had even tried to compromise with a verdict of Not Proven, but still he would not be moved. So, Not Guilty of Cowardice was what he had done for her, but Guilty of Desertion was inevitable. Even she knew that.

  “Commander, you know the sentence.”

  “Yes,” Ansah said. “I request the Court to allow me to carry it out on myself, in accordance with military custom.”

  “That’s granted, of course. You have until midnight. The Court Secretary will bring you the necessary substances.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Commander,” the Chairman said, “would you like us to provide you with a companion of some kind?”

  “Yes. I’d like my guard, if he agrees.” She turned to the Sakhran. “Will you?”

  “Of course,” he said. It was the first time they had spoken to each other.

  •

  The pictures faded from where Foord had imagined them, in some quasi-space behind the words of the transcript; then the words themselves faded from the screen. He turned away. His grief for Ansah had come, occupied its allotted time, and gone; much like his relationship with her. What it left was a sense of unfamiliarity, the knowledge that she was no longer a part of the universe. It would make the shape of his life different. The rest of his life, for as far as he chose to see it, would be devoted to Faith. We were made for each other. We belong together.

  He recounted his mission briefing from the Department. It was an irritating document, overwritten and portentous (the Department always knew more than it let on, or thought it did) and ultimately of no use to him. Everyone wants to know what She is and where She comes from. Me, I’m interested only in what She’s done. I’ve studied what She’s done, and I know how to defeat Her.

  “Thahl.”

  “Commander?”

  “Lay in
a course for Blentport on Sakhra, please.”

  PART FOUR

  1

  It was a late autumn afternoon, and the sun Horus bled through a bandage of clouds. He arrived alone, cramped and tired after the journey. Foord was disappointed, but not surprised, when they didn’t come out to meet him.

  Almost before he stepped out, the Sakhran landchariot which brought him clattered back towards the lowlands, its driver hissing and flaying the team. He looked up at Hrissihr and saw the great black disc daubed over one of its buttresses. A srahr: he remembered reading about it in his mission briefing from the Department.

  The srahr (unlike the name of the historical figure, it is not written with a capital S) is recurrent in Sakhran culture. It is the silent letter in their alphabet, and the symbol of zero and infinity in their mathematics. In their past legends it is the mark of apocalypse, and in their present legends the mark of the unidentified ship, which for reasons of their own they call Faith. This ship came once before, over three hundred years ago, and they know it will soon return. You are not the only visitor they are expecting.

  He gave the black disc a cursory glance, aware that they would be watching for his reaction. Then he turned his attention elsewhere around the massive hillcastle, noting details with the habitual precision of a warship commander. The wind swore down at him and he tasted two distinct liquids, one from his watering eyes and the other from his running nose.

  Hrissihr rose before him like the fist of a subterranean arm. He counted off one minute, concluded the Sakhrans would not be coming out, and walked into the main courtyard. Several doors led off it, each one—he knew from his briefings—the entrance to a separate Sakhran apartment. Hrissihr looked like the castle of some single absolute ruler, but it wasn’t; it was the home of many Sakhran families, although, being Sakhrans, they stayed behind their own doors and rarely met socially. Tonight was to be an exception, with a dinner in the little-used Main Hall to mark his arrival.

  The walls of the courtyard were hung with iron braziers, some containing fires which spat as he passed them, others empty beneath old soot-smears, recording the departure of Sakhran families to the Commonwealth lowlands, or to other hillcastles higher and further away. In the wind from the Irsirrha Hills, dead leaves rushed across the flagstones and clamoured against the shut doors. He picked up one; it was dark grey-green, its veins dry and spatulate. He tossed it away and the wind snatched it.

  Sulhu chose that moment to appear.

  “Commander Foord! You’re very welcome.”

  Together they walked across the courtyard, Foord treading the dead leaves noisily and the Sakhran avoiding them gracefully. A few doors opened, and other Sakhrans peered warily from their apartments at Foord; either he was carrying some disease, or was the disease. Sulhu, though, treated him warmly, as if they’d known each other for years and this wasn’t the first time they had ever met. He took Foord’s arm and looked up at him as they walked, smiling a dark red mouthful of pointed teeth and chattering in perfect if rather sibilant Commonwealth.

  “Your journey here wasn’t too tiring, I hope? I’ve been looking forward to this meeting. My son Thahl has told me all about you. I’m delighted that you could come up here and visit us while your ship is on Sakhra. Come in, come in….”

  •

  “You haven’t seemed completely at ease tonight, Commander Foord. I hope the food wasn’t to blame.”

  “The food was fine, thank you. The fact is, I rarely get invited anywhere twice. I don’t make a very good guest.”

  “Yes, my son Thahl says you call it Social Awkwardness. Then there’s also the long journey, and Director Swann’s opposition to your visit here. My invitation was well-meant, but perhaps not well-judged.”

  “It was both, and very much appreciated. Also, my visit here is a useful reminder to the Director that I don’t take orders from him.” Swann was Director of Horus Fleet—regular military—and found having an Outsider at Blentport deeply insulting.

  The silence lengthened. Sulhu’s eyes were unwavering behind the occasional horizontal flicker of their secondary lids. His ophidian face, usually rather immobile, seemed to crawl under the play of firelight.

  “Alright, Commander. You’ve had an evening of small talk over dinner with my neighbours. Let’s not continue it. Can we talk freely? You’re off the record here, you know.”

  Most Sakhrans were natural linguists, but Foord found Sulhu’s near-fluency disconcerting; it made him sound like he understood humans as well as he understood their language.

  “You mean, Talk Freely about what I’m doing here?”

  “Everyone knows what you’re doing here, Commander. Me especially. My son Thahl gave me an outline of your orders.”

  His son Thahl sat deferentially silent and to one side, partly hidden in shadow. The dinner to welcome Foord had finished and the rest of those who attended—only a minority of those living at Hrissihr—had gone back to their apartments across the courtyard, or across other courtyards, and closed their doors behind them. Their empty chairs remained in a crescent round the dwindling fire. There had been much about the dinner—soft low light, murmured conversations, carefully judged understatement—which reminded Foord of the Charles Manson.

  Foord turned and glared pointedly at Thahl, who showed no obvious embarrassment. The slender Sakhran darkwood chair on which Foord sat, although much stronger than it looked, still creaked under his weight.

  “As well as being your son, Thahl is an officer on my ship. Those orders are confidential. Or were.”

  “I said Outline, Commander, not details. Everyone knows them in outline. And in any case, Commonwealth law recognises no secrets within a Sakhran family.”

  Since Sakhrans reproduced asexually once or twice in a lifetime, the father-son bond was strong; it was the only bond which was, since all the others had weakened over the last three hundred years. Hillcastles like Hrissihr provided the minimum for life, housing families of two, or sometimes three, who ate together only rarely. Fathers died, sons grew into almost the same identity, and reproduced; then died, and their sons grew into almost the same identity, and reproduced; then died. Sakhran society was conservative and minimal.

  Foord knew all that from his long association with Thahl, but the detailed point about Commonwealth law had been covered in his briefing, and he should have remembered it.

  “Of course,” he said hastily, and to both of them. “My apologies.”

  Sulhu nodded, deadpan. “You’re not a very good guest. I won’t be inviting any more Socially Awkward people here.”

  The evening wore on, and still Foord stayed talking. Despite his misgivings, and with all the issues looming in the background, he found himself enjoying it: Thahl’s father was good company. Thahl himself hardly said a word, having clearly decided to leave them to each other.

  “I was watching you, of course, when you saw the srahr,” Sulhu said. “Later I watched you examine a dead leaf. Both are getting numerous. We’re well provisioned here for our winter, but are your people provisioned for theirs?”

  “What makes you ask that?”

  “I listen to Commonwealth broadcasts, Commander. I read Commonwealth journals. They all refer to Faith as a distant thunder. They hint that whole systems, including this one, may be battened down if She comes. I’m old and diseased and will soon die, so few things worry me; but that does.”

  Tall narrow windows were scored down one wall of the Hall, like clawmarks. Foord stood up, stretched, and strode over to gaze out of one of them, his heels clacking on the flagstones. He was tall and powerfully built, dark-haired and bearded, a fourth-generation native of one of the Commonwealth’s heavy-gravity planets. He exuded a musky odour, like a lion. People meeting him for the first time found his quietness and reticence so at odds with his appearance as to be unnatural, almost threatening.

  “Why does it worry you?”

  The Sakhran laughed drily. “Because they’ve sent you here. The prospect of being
anywhere nearby when you find Her is not appealing.”

  “But you’re old and diseased and will soon die.”

  Sulhu inclined his head, in the way of acknowledging a hit. Foord thought, It must be all this time around Thahl. I’m beginning to learn irony.

  “Well,” Sulhu said, “there’s also the fact that my son will be on your ship.”

  “No. There’s something else that worries you. Something you haven’t told me.” It amounted to calling his host a liar, so Foord spoke carefully. “But I think you will, when you’ve worked out how to say it.”

  He continued to gaze through the leaded glass where the cold blaze of Blentport and its surrounding cities was spread out far below, prominences flaring now and then as ships landed for refit or lifted off to join the cordon around Sakhra. Under the huge Sakhran night, the spaceport seemed both mighty and vulnerable; like a beached whale, its size made it weak.

  “An impressive spaceport,” Sulhu observed. “Much more impressive than anything we had. And yet, do you know how it got its name? When Sakhra became absorbed by, or rather was Invited To Join, the Commonwealth two hundred years ago”—Sulhu’s vocal irony, like all other forms of Sakhran irony, was light and subtle—“we pointed out Srahr’s tomb and asked that no human should ever go there uninvited to read his Book. For no better reason than that, a man named Rikkard Blent did. We caught him before he entered and later returned his still living body to the lowlands. The Commonwealth never actually retaliated, except—rather injudiciously if you ask me—to name Blentport after him.”

  Sulhu paused for a moment. When he resumed, the irony had drained from his voice.

  “To name its biggest spaceport after a silly man who thought he could come up here and just read the Book of Srahr. Srahr was the greatest of us, Commander. Poet, philosopher, soldier, scientist; and, unfortunately, author. We never recovered from his literary career… Must you go back tomorrow morning, Commander?”