The remaining Gentlemen pulled together quickly and turned to fight the horde that pressed them; but the scythe-blades were sharp and the arms strong. Only the gentlemen in the front rank could use their lasers, and the hall was narrow. Churls screamed and died on lances of light, but their cousins behind them chopped off the arms that held the pistols. The Gentlemen fell back, retreating further and further upward, to their Lord’s bedchamber.
The Lord stood in the doorway, beckoning. Quickly, the Gentlemen filed into the room, and the huge door boomed shut behind them. A moment later, the churls filled the corridor, bellowing for blood. Two Soldiers shouldered their way to the fore, attacking the oak with battle-axes.
Inside the Lord swung back a section of wall and stood back while his family and all his Gentlemen filed down a hidden spiral staircase. The Lord waited till the last man was past him, then sealed the wall behind him. When the Soldiers broke into the room, it was empty.
Half an hour later and a mile away, the Lord and his retinue filed out of a hidden tunnel mouth. The churls were gone from the village; they had no trouble stealing horses. They mounted and rode away, cantering through the night.
Dirk marched with the garnet in his ear, now; the reports were beginning to come in quickly. He looked about him and saw only darkened woodland. Occasionally, he caught a glimpse of an outlaw sliding through a moonbeam, and there was always the dark bulk of DeCade a little in front of him, and Madelon, Father Fletcher, and Lapin behind; but that small band could almost have been walking alone through the forest.
And they weren’t showing any sign of slackening. Dirk wasn’t, either, but it was only good acting; his legs felt like noodles. It had been three hours since DeCade had called a rest.
His earphone buzzed; Dirk lowered his head, frowning. “Dulain here.” He listened silently, then nodded. “Received, with thanks. Keep me informed.” Then he looked up at the giant. “DeCade! Most of the castles have fallen; only a handful still fight—the ones where we had none of the Soldiers.”
DeCade nodded. “As expected. Those few will fight well into tomorrow, and some may need a full siege. No matter; we should have men to send them in plenty, by this hour tomorrow.”
Dirk frowned; the giant didn’t even seem to conceive of failure anymore. It could be a good thing, but … “In many of the castles, the Lords escaped.”
DeCade nodded again. “Of course. Let them ride through the night till they come to Albemarle. Let them ride.”
It didn’t seem like good tactics; why go against any stronger a garrison then they had to, at the King’s castle? But Dirk shrugged, and, with a sigh, relayed the order on up, then looked up at DeCade, frowning thoughtfully. “Uh … some of the agents saw the fighting. They were flabbergasted by its smoothness.”
“Were they?”
Dirk bit down on a surge of irritation, then let it pass. “Yes. You must admit it looks a little strange—a horde of peasants who’ve never had any military training, falling in like the best-disciplined army, each man doing exactly what he’s supposed to, without question, with perfect coordination, perfect timing.”
“Why should this surprise you?” DeCade countered. “You saw it at the arena.”
“Well, yes. But I didn’t understand it then, either.”
“Even though you felt it well enough to act on it.” DeCade smiled tightly. “Still, you wish the names for it.”
Dirk nodded. “We sky-men are peculiar that way, yes.” Suddenly, bitterly, he felt his isolation from these people again.
DeCade sighed and came to a stop. He pressed a hand to his forehead, muttering, “I must have your words.” He stood a moment in silence, stiffened. Lapin, Madelon, and the priest stared in alarm. Dirk gave them what he hoped was a reassuring nod and turned back to DeCade.
The giant lifted his head, took a long breath, then nodded and strode forward once again. “Well enough. You know our people are descended from a mere dozen, each of whom was multiplied by magic—‘cloned,’ you call it—into many thousands.”
Dirk nodded.
“Seven hundred years go by,” DeCade went on. “The blood of those twelve has mingled again and again, but with no more mingling between types than the Lords could possibly help. There are now twelve clans—but each member of each clan is as like to every other as peas in a pod.”
“Genetically identical,” Dirk murmured. DeCade nodded. “That is your term. It takes sharp looking to tell one Tradesman from another. And the mode of living the Lords enforce for each clan makes all homes alike. At first each set of parents was somewhat different, probably; but as time went on, the differences damped out; within each clan, the people of each generation behaved more and more like one another. Each person had the same heredity; and, since parents and lifestyle are nearly identical, each person has an environment virtually the same. A Tradesman’s house is different from a Farmer’s, and a country Tradesman’s house is different from a town Tradesman’s—but town Tradesmen live in town, and have for several hundred years. Where your grandfather was born, so were you.”
“Yes,” Dirk murmured, remembering the family traditions his father had taught him. “For seven hundred years.”
“Well, there you have it.” DeCade shrugged. “Within each clan, heredity and environment are identical for every person.”
Dirk stopped as though he’d run into a brick wall.
DeCade stopped, too, nodding down at him, brooding. “You told it to this body; did you realize what it meant? If heredity and environment are identical, behavior must be identical, too. Give any Tradesman a stimulus, and he will react like any other Tradesman. We know this; we feel it; and so we know what each of our clansmen will do. All know each other’s actions before they do them; each knows what must be done. However, there is still enough of human caution in any group so that no man will move until another does. But give them one man to walk before them, and all will walk behind him, do as he does—for they know, in any set of circumstances, everything that must be done.”
“And the leader could be any one of them.” Dirk flashed the mental picture of the caterpillars crawling around and around the rim of the flowerpot again, and shuddered. He shook his head quickly to rid himself of it. “But some clans would have natural reactions that wouldn’t fit the situation.”
DeCade nodded, turned away, and began walking again. “They must be made to understand that silence is necessary till the battle’s joined, or you lose all advantage of surprise. So the Wizard sent directions down the ages; he set his battle-plan to rhyme and tune and gave it piecemeal to the churls to sing. Fathers teach these songs to sons, mothers to daughters—and they become a part of the environment. With those songs echoing in mind tonight, each verse called up as events cued it, no churl could set foot wrong.”
“A natural army,” Dirk breathed, “bred that way for seven hundred years.” He had a sudden terrifying vision of what his cousins could do if they were ever unleashed upon the galaxy.
DeCade nodded. “And thus the Lords made certain their own downfall. They planned this world well and thoroughly, and made it adhere to that plan down through the centuries. But no plan can include all factors because the factors change, and no man can read the future till it’s done. The human creature is perverse, is it not? We always find the road the intellect did not see, nor want.”
Dirk thought of Finagle and held his peace.
The Lord de Breton galloped through the night with his family and his entourage; their hooves rumbled like cannon wheels through the moonlight.