A Deepness in the Sky

His attention came back to the center of the plaza. This side was almost free of snow. There were odd shapes ahead, half-hidden by the darkness. Scarcely thinking, he walked toward them. The ground was clear of snow, and it crunched like frozen moss. He stopped, sucked in a breath. The dark things at the center—they were statues. Of Spiders! A few more seconds and he'd report the find, but for the moment he wondered at the scene alone and in silence. Of course, they already knew the natives' approximate form; there had been some crude pictures found by the earlier landings. But—Vinh stepped up the image scan—these were lifelike statues, molded in exquisite detail out of some dark metal. There were three of the creatures, life-sized he guessed. The word "spider" is common language, the sort of term that dissolves to near uselessness in the light of specific examination. In the temps of Ezr's childhood there had been several types of critter called "spiders." Some had six legs, some eight, some ten or twelve. Some were fat and hairy. Some were slender, black, and venomous. These creatures looked a lot like the slender, ten-legged kind. But either they were wearing clothes, or they were spinier than their tiny namesakes. Their legs were wrapped around each other, all reaching for something hidden beneath them. Making war, making love, what? Even Vinh's imagination floundered.

What had it been like here, when last the sun shone bright?

FOUR

It is an edged cliché that the world is most pleasant in the years of a Waning Sun. It is true that the weather is not so driven, that everywhere there is a sense of slowing down, and most places experience a few years where the summers do not burn and the winters are not yet overly fierce. It is the classic time of romance. It's a time that seductively beckons higher creatures to relax, postpone. It's the last chance to prepare for the end of the world.

By blind good fortune, Sherkaner Underhill chose the most beautiful days in the years of the Waning for his first trip to Lands Command. He soon realized his good luck was doubled: The winding coastal roads had not been designed for automobiles, and Sherkaner was not nearly so skilled an automobilist as he had thought. More than once he came careening into a hairpin turn with the auto's drive belt improperly applied, and nothing but steering and brakes to keep him from flying into the misty blue of the Great Sea (though no doubt he'd fall short, to the forest below, but still with deadly effect).

Sherkaner loved it. Inside of a few hours he had gotten the hang of operating the machine. Now when he tipped up on two wheels it was almost on purpose. It was a beautiful drive. The locals called this route the Pride of Accord, and the Royal Family had never dared complain. This was the height of a summer. The forest was fully thirty years old, about as old as trees could ever get. They reached straight and high and green, and grew right up to the edge of the highway. The scent of flowers and forest resin drifted cool past his perch on the auto.

He didn't see many other civilian autos. There were plenty of osprechs pulling carts, some trucks, and an inconvenient number of army convoys. The reactions he got from the civilians were a wonderful mix: irritated, amused, envious. Even more than around Princeton, he saw wenches who looked pregnant and guys with dozens of baby welts on their backs. Some of their waves seemed envious of more than Sherk's automobile.And sometimes I'm a little envious of them. For a while, he played with the thought, not trying to rationalize it. Instinct was such a fascinating thing, especially when you saw it from the inside.

The miles passed by. While his body and senses reveled in the drive, the back of Sherkaner's mind was ticking away: grad school, how to sell Lands Command on his scheme, the truly multitudinous ways this auto-mobile could be improved. He pulled into a little forest town late the first afternoon.NIGH'T'DEEPNESS, the antique sign said; Sherkaner wasn't sure if that was a place name or a simple description.

He stopped at the local blacksmith's. The smith had the same odd smile as some of the people on the road. "Nice auto-mobile you have there, mister." Actually itwas a very nice and expensive automobile, a brand-new Relmeitch. It was totally beyond the means of the average college student. Sherkaner had won it at an off-campus casino two days earlier. That had been a chancy thing. Sherkaner's aspect was well known at all the gambling houses around Princeton. The owners' guild had told him they'd break every one of his arms if they ever caught him gambling in the city again. Still, he'd been ready to leave Princeton anyway—and he really wanted to experiment with automobiles. The smith sidled around the automobile, pretending to admire the silver trim and the three rotating power cylinders. "So. Kinda far from home, ain'tcha? Whatcha going to do when it stops working?"

"Buy some kerosene?"