"They may not war for mastery," Neq answered. "No, I have not forgotten. But the empire is dead, and so are its conventions."
"It is not dead until we know the Weaponless is dead--and he is a difficult man to kill, as you would know had you ever met him in the circle. And the circle code is not dead where my tribe travels."
"It is dead wherever your tribe departs, however." But Neq approved the fine order Tyl maintained. "I did not say I came to challenge you with weapon, for I may not use my sword on this mission. Were any man to question my competence in the circle, I should be glad to show him my blade--but not for mastery, not for death, only for demonstration, no blood shed. I challenge you only to do a service for me, and perhaps for the nomad society."
Tyl smiled. "I would do you a service without inducement in the circle, however circumspectly hinted, for we were comrades in better days. And I would aid the nomad society if I only knew how. What is it you wish?"
"Go to the crazies."
Tyl laughed.
"Nevertheless," Neq said, remembering how Sol had reacted to disbelief, so many years ago. More than half Neq's life had passed since his conquest by Sol of All Weapons.
Tyl lookeu at him more closely, responsive to the tone. "I have heard--this is merely rumor--that you were injured in a conflict with outlaws."
"Many times."
"The first time. That they overcame you by means of the advantage of fifty men and a gun, and cut off your hands."
Neq glanced down at his cloth-wrapped extremities, nodding.
"And that you achieved some semblance of vengeance... nevertheless."
"They slew my wife."
"And she was a crazy?"
"She was."
"Yet now you espouse another crazy cause?"
Neq's sword-arm twitched under the cloth. "Do you slight my wife?"
"By no means," Tyl said quickly. "I merely remark that you have had adventures I have not, and must have strong motive for your mission."
Neq shrugged.
"I will go to the crazies," Tyl said. "If I do not find reason to stay, I will return to my tribe."
"That suffices."
"Any other favor I can do you?" Tyl inquired dryly.
"If you can tell me where the Weaponless might be."
Tyl controlled his surprise. "He has been absent five years. I doubt he resides within the crazy demesnes."
"His wife, then."
"She remains my guest. I will take you to her."
"I thank you."
Tyl stood, a fair, rather handsome man, a leader. "Now that our business is done, come with me to the circle. I would show my men swordsmanship of the old style. No blood, no terms."
It was Neq's turn to smile. On such basis he could enter the circle. It had been long since he had sworded for fun, following the rules of empire.
And it was a pleasure. Whether Tyl remained his superior no one could say, for Neq's technique had necessarily changed, and they were not fighting in earnest. But Tyl's art was beautiful, rivaling that of Sol of All Weapons in the old days, and the display the two of them put on left the more recent members of the tribe gaping. Feint and counterfeint; thrust and parry; offense and defense, with the sunlight flashing, flashing, flashing from living blades and the melody of combat resounding to the welkin.
When they finished, panting, the tribesmen remained seated around the circle, rows and rings of armed men, silent. "I have told you of Sol," Tyl said to them. "And of Tor, of Neq. Now you have seen Neq, though his hands are gone. Such was our empire."
And Neq felt a glow he had not experienced in years, for Tyl was giving him public compliment. Suddenly he longed for the empire again, for the good things it had brought. And his determination to complete his mission despite the barriers the crazies were erecting was doubled.
Sola had aged. Neq remembered her as a rare beauty, truculent but gifted with phenomenal sex appeal, fit for a single man to dream about. Now her face was lined, her body bent. Her long dark hair no longer flowed, it straggled. It was hard to believe that she was only two or three years older than he.
"This is Neq the Sword," Tyl said to her, and departed.
"I would not have recognized you," Sola said. "You look old. Yet you are younger than I. Where is the shy young warrior with the magic sword and the golden voice?"
To each his own perspective! "Does the Weaponless live?"
"I fear he does not. But he would not return to me, regardless."
Neq was surprised. "To whom, then?"
"His other wife. She of the underworld."
His interest intensified. "You know of Helicon?"
"I know my husband laid siege to the mountain, because she was there. She has his bracelet and his name."
"She lives?"
"I do not know. Do any live--who were there when the fire came?"
"Yes," he said. Then, quickly: "Or so it is rumored."
She was on the slip immediately. Sola had never been stupid; she had taught the warriors counting and figuring. "If any live, she lives. I know it. Seek her out, tell her I would meet her. Ask her--ask her if my child--"
Neq waited, but she only cried silently.
"You must go to the crazies," he said finally.
"Why not? I have nothing to live for."
"This woman of the Weaponless--what name does she bear?"
"His old name. Sos. The one I would have had, had I not been a foolish girl blinded by power. By the time he was mine, he was not mine, and he was nameless."
"So she would be Sosa. She would know if the Weaponless lives?"
"She is with him if he lives. But my child--ask her--"
Neq made a connection. "Your child by Sol? Who went with him to the mountain?"
"More or less," she answered.
He thought of the skeletons he had swept from the underground halls. A number had been small--children and babies. Yet there had been several exit passages such as the one Dick the Surgeon had used. There had been some unburned caverns as well as the little wagon-tunnels to scattered depots. Some adults had escaped, perhaps many; no one knew how large Helicon's population had been. Some children could have....
"I have one more name for you," Sola said. "Var--Var the Stick."
Neq had some vague recollection of such a warrior, a helper to the Weaponless who had disappeared at the same time. "He will know where to find the Weaponless?"
"He must know," she said fervently. "He was the protege of my husband, and sterile like him."
Neq wondered how she could know such a thing. But he remembered the rumors about this woman, and how she had gone to Sos's tent in the badlands camp, and wondered again. "I will seek Sosa," he said. "And Var the Stick."
"And my child--Soli. She would be thirteen now, almost fourteen. Dark-haired. And--" She hesitated. "You remember the way I used to be?"
"Yes." Her figure had stimulated him many times, fifteen years ago.
"She favors me, I think."
Soli would be a beauty, then. Neq nodded. "I will send them all to the crazies--if they live."
"I will wait there." And for some reason she was crying. Perhaps it was the weakness of an old woman who knew she would never see her husband or her daughter again; who knew that their bones lay charred and buried near the mountain of death.
Dick the Surgeon located several of the strangely-named fugitives in the next few months. Men like John and Charles and Robert, men old and feeble and obviously unused to the way of the nomads despite their recent years among them. Some were refugees from Helicon; others seemed to be crazies, cut off by the breakdown of civilization. Dick talked to them, and glimmers of hope brightened their forlorn faces and they agreed to come with Neq--to Neq's suppressed disgust. Now he had to forage for them, and guard them against outlaws, for they were almost unable to do for themselves and could not make the trek to Dr. Jones alone. A man with no hands taking care of men with no gumption!