Star Wars - Lando Calrissian and the Mindharp of Sharu Page 5

  “For you see, despite their humble estate, they observe and practice an ancient system of beliefs which, if taken literally not only explains the present unenviable condition of the Toka, but promises more for the properly prepared and sufficiently daring.

  “Much, much more.”

  The inhuman voice died with a hiss, as if its owner expected some question or remark from the gambler seated before him. Instead, Lando simply looked at the odd figure, forcing himself, despite an inner cringing, to gaze calmly into the lunatic eyes of the sorcerer.

  Meanwhile, the governor had managed to recover enough to press a button on his desk, order the Toka servant it summoned to obtain another chair for his “colleague.” But the elderly creature could not be induced by kind words (of which the governor uttered but few) or threats (of which he had many in supply) to come near the threatening gray-swathed figure.

  In the end, after an embarrassing impasse, Mer himself was forced to rise from his oversized office swiveler, bring the chair in from the next room, and place it for the robed magician. To Lando’s amusement, the fat executive had nearly as much difficulty as the Toka forcing himself to come near Rokur Gepta.

  Lando himself attempted to relax, settled back, and regarded his cigar, which had long since expired from inattention. Again, seemingly from nowhere, the Toka servant materialized to light it, then, still cowering under the baleful gaze of the sorcerer, vanished once again with a shuffle of bare feet on plush carpet.

  “Promises precisely what?” Lando asked after a long time, somehow managing to sound casual. Half a hundred wild speculations formed in his mind as he said it, but he repressed them savagely, waiting Gepta out.

  “Among other things,” the sorcerer whispered, “the Ultimate Instrument of Music.”

  Great, thought Lando, his fantasies collapsing. It could have been diamonds, platinum, or flamegems; it could have been immortality or Absolute Power; it could have been a good five-microcredit cigar. The guy wants zithers and trombones.

  “The Mindharp of Sharu”—Gepta explained as he seated himself, “has been an article of the simple faith among the Toka for centuries uncounted.

  “As you are not doubt aware, the current human population of Rafa—not to mention numerous representatives of many other associated species—dates from the early days of the late, unlamented Republic. What is not generally appreciated by historians is that, in the chaotic, erratically recorded era preceding, a respectable amount of exploration and settlement was also carried out, albeit haphazardly. Thus, when Republican colonists arrived in the Rafa for the first time, they discovered it already occupied by human life.

  “The Toka.”

  “I must explain that, for some decades, I have employed others—anthropologists, ethnologists, and the like, many of them incarcerees of the penal colony here and thus anxious to reduce the burden of their sentences—to observe, record, and analyze the ritual behavior of the Toka, believing that, in the the long run, such an effort might produce some particle of interest or profit. I have made many such investments of time and wealth throughout civilized space.

  “The Toka, savages that they be, have little or nothing in the way of social organization. Infrequently, however, and at unpredictable intervals, they gather together in small bands for the purpose of ritual chanting, to all appearances the passing-on of a purely verbal heritage.

  “Their legends acknowledge that they came, originally, from elsewhere in the galaxy—would-be pioneers and explorers, employing a technology which they subsequently somehow discarded or lost. They, too, found the Rafa already occupied. Their tradition speaks of the Sharu, a superhumaniod race perhaps billions of years advanced in evolution, too terrible to look upon directly or contemplate at any length.

  “The Sharu were, of course, responsible for the monumental construction which characterizes this system, a style of architecture betraying a bent of mind so alien that, for the most part, even the purpose of the structures cannot be guessed. It is unclear whether mere contact with the Sharu ‘broke’ the Broken People, or whether it was the Sham’s later hasty departure.

  “For depart they did.

  “Legends maintain that their flight was in the face of something even more terrible than they, something they feared greatly, although whether another species, some disease, or some unimaginable something else, we cannot so much as conjecture. They left their massive buildings, they left, apparently, the life-orchards whose original function is as obscure as everything else regarding the Sharu, and they left the Toka, crushed and enfeebled by some aspect of their experience with the Sharu.”

  Lando reflected on Gepta’s words while he let himself be offered another cigar.

  It seemed to him that the question of what broke the Broken People was of considerably less pragmatic interest than whatever put such a scare into their superhuman masters. He hated to think of something like that still hanging around the galaxy. A starship captain’s life (he knew better from vicarious experience than from any of his own) carried him through many a long, lonely parsec in the darkness. And many a ship has disappeared without so much as a trail of neutrinos to mark its passing.

  The Toka servant, skirting Gepta, lit Lando’s cigar.

  The latter said, finally, “What’s all this got to do with me?”

  From within the voluminous folds of his ash-colored robes, Gepta extracted an object about the size of a human hand, constructed of some lightweight, bright untarnished golden metal.

  It was Lando’s turn to blink.

  Viewed from one perspective, the device seemed to be a large, three-tined fork—until the gambler looked again. Two tines or four? Or maybe three again? The thing just wouldn’t settle down in his field of vision, giving him, instead, the beginnings of a headache when he stared at it too closely or for more than a few seconds.

  Gepta placed the object carefully on Duttes Mer’s crystalline desk, where it seemed to writhe and pulse without actually moving. The governor gazed dowr at it with an uninterpretable expression on his face—somewhere between dismay and greed.

  “We have reason to believe,” Rokur Gepta hissed, “that this object is a Key—perhaps it is a miniature of the Mindharp itself, although that is only surmise. It was … shall we say, obtained in an altogether different system, from a small, shabby museum. But it came originally from the Rafa System and is a Sharu artifact. Of that there is not the slightest doubt.”

  Somehow, without being told, Lando knew that there were volumes of adventure, betrayal, and deceit behind the sketchy explanation Gepta had just given. He had no doubt it was a story best left untold.

  “A key,” he repeated. “What the blazes does it unlock, if one may ask?”

  “One may ask,” the sorcerer replied in a threatening whisper, “but with a great deal more deference and respect in the future than is your customary practice!”

  “A thousand pardons!” Lando tried to keep the sarcasm he felt out of his voice, with only partial success. “Pray what does it unlock, noble magician?”

  Gepta paused as if trying to gauge Lando’s sincerity, then shrugged it off as of no practical consequence. “There is evidence to indicate it provides access to the Mindharp of Sharu. The Mindharp is the focus of a thousand Toka rituals. The fools believe it produced music so sweetly compelling—isn’t that just precious!—that it was capable of swaying the most unfeeling of hearts, even across vast distances of space.”

  The Rafa was a multiplanet system, but, given the millions of miles of hard vacuum between planets, Lando reserved judgment. He’d seen legends come to nothing before.

  Gepta mentioned that some versions of the legends had the Mindharp as the principal means of communication between the mighty Sharu and their human “pets.” What the Mindharp looked like and precisely where it might be found, these questions remained unanswered.

  It was up to Lando to answer them.

  Or else.

  For his part, Lando wondered what the value of such a
n instrument might be to a system governor or a Sorcerer of Tund. And he wondered again about the terrible unnamed agency which had caused the presumably powerful Sharu to flee their home system like so many panicky mice.

  “Okay,” he answered finally, “what’s in it for me if I find the Mindharp for you?”

  The sorcerer turned slightly in his chair, gave Lando the full benefit of his terrifying gaze. “How about your continued liberty?”

  For the first time since fetching the sorcerer a chair, Duttes Mer found the wherewithal to speak for himself. “There is also your ship to consider.”

  “And your life!” Gepta finished in a tone that made Lando’s tailbone quiver uneasily.

  He ignored it, pretending a nonchalance he didn’t feel: “Well,” he said, “two out of three isn’t bad. I was planning to sell the ship. It’s of no use to—”

  “That you shall not do, foolish mortal!” Gepta seemed suddenly to swell in size and power. “This entire system is covered with Sharu ruins. We have no idea, as yet, in which of them the Mindharp lies awaiting us. You may very well need the vessel to—”

  “Okay, okay. I get your point.” Secretly, Lando congratulated himself on having been able to interrupt the sorcerer. He hated being intimidated by anyone and made a practice of disintimidating himself as quickly as he could. “I get a ship I don’t want, my life and liberty—which I already had before I stumbled into this rustic metropolis of yours. I don’t want to appear unappreciative of your boundless generosity, my dear fellow-beings, but let’s negotiate a bonus. A little something for the overhead?”

  Mer leaned forward over his desk, not a particularly easy feat considering his treelike torso and the neck nature had seen fit not to endow him with. A threatening look darkened his face as he opened his mouth to speak, but he was stopped short by a hiss from Gepta.

  “Incentives, my dear governor, incentives. Do not seal down the intakes of the droids who refine the fuel. We shall indeed offer our brave captain a little something as recompense. Captain Calrissian, would a full cargo of life-crystals from the orchards be acceptable?”

  The sorcerer’s tone implied it had damn well better be. Mer looked sharply at Gepta. He might be afraid of the gray-robed figure, but it was his bread and butter they were negotiating away. He opened his mouth again, saw that Gepta was serious, and closed it to stifle a groan.

  Lando grinned. “I imagine that it will take rather a deal of fancy paperwork to cover up the shortage.”

  “Which is precisely, my dear Captain”—the sorcerer turned contemptuously toward Mer, and the governor shrank from his gaze—“what bureaucrats are for.”

  “Okay, Gepta, so far, so good. But what’s to keep you two from seizing my ship and returning me to the tender mercies of the constabulary once I get the Mindharp for you? The most extravagant offer in the universe is a cheap price to pay if you don’t intend—”

  “Peace!” A long pause for consideration, then: “We shall deliver the cargo to your possession before you begin your search for the Mindharp—silence, Governor! However, we shall also have our menials at the port of Teguta Lusat render your Millennium Falcon incapable of leaving the system—in case you decide to play us falsely yourself—while leaving it perfectly suitable for travel from planet to planet within the system. Once you have secured that which we all seek so ardently, your vessel will be repaired and you will be free to go. Is this agreeable?”

  Lando thought. It still wasn’t much of a guarantee. In fact, it was the same lousy deal as before, with his ship—or at least its ultralight capacities—as bait instead of the life-crystals. Still, it was all, he was sure, they were going to offer him.

  It was a great deal more than he’d expected after Mer’s thugs had worked him over.

  “All right,” he said through a weary sigh that was at least half genuine. “It beats sitting around in jail.”

  Or having one’s mind sucked away by the life-orchards, he thought grimly to himself.

  • V •

  “I HAVEN’T THE foggiest notion! Anyway, what possible business is it of yours?”

  Lando stalked moodily along the narrow streetside toward a transit stop. His gaudy shipsuit had at least been restored to him, even his diminutive stingbeam. This last decorative touch, he reasoned bitterly, was yet another educational message from Rokur Gepta and Duttes Mer, underlining ironically what they imagined was his utter helplessness. Well, they’d learn better.

  Trouble was, Lando couldn’t think of how to accomplish that at the moment.

  Vuffi Raa clattered beside him, carrying the rest of his luggage, which had been somewhat battered during the assault on the hotel room.

  “But Master, I mean, Captain—”

  “Call me Lando!”

  “Er, Lando, how am I to help you if you won’t tell me what’s required of us? I know nothing about what’s going on. I spent the entire night in the Confiscated Properties Room at Constabulary headquarters, sandwiched between bales of illicit smoking vegetables and wire baskets overflowing with vibroknives, murder hatchets, and the like.”

  At the thought, the little droid suffered an involuntary mechanical shudder, which originated at its torso seams and rippled along all five tentacles to their slim-fingered extremities.

  Lando’s bags bobbed up and down until the seizure passed.

  “Did you know,” the robot offered in a subdued, conciliatory voice, “that most of the spouse killings in this system are accomplished with cast-titanium skillets?”

  Lando stopped suddenly, stared back at Vuffi Raa in anger. “With a sharp blow to the cranium, or simply bad cooking? Look, my mechanical albatross, there’s nothing personal in this. It’s simply that I haven’t the faintest clue where or how to begin the idiot quest they’ve blackmailed me into, and I stand a far better chance if I don’t have to spend my time stumbling over a useless—”

  “Master, I do not wish to oppose your will in this matter. In fact, such would violate my most fundamental programming to the point of incapacitating me. However—”

  “I don’t give a damn what happens to your capacitors!”

  “—however, before you sell me again, I am determined to prove to you that I am, indeed, far from useless. Perhaps even slightly indispensable.”

  Lando stopped again in the middle of the boardwalk, looking down with contempt at the little suitcase-laden automaton. He took a deep breath.

  “That, my esteemed collection of clockwork cowardice, would be something to see. What precisely have you in mind?”

  Vuffi Raa paused. A lengthy silence followed, and hovercars and repulsor vehicles were suddenly audible swishing by in the narrow, twisted avenue.

  Without warning the droid suddenly spoke once more.

  “So that is the difficulty; I believe I understand at last. The hotel room. The Constabulary. Your cries to me for help. Your preference, as I understand it, is that I should have been somewhat more, er … physically demonstrative. Even, perhaps, at the risk of worsening the charges against you?”

  Lando turned on a booted heel, wordlessly resumed his march down the street. A bus went by, bearing half a dozen gawking tourists being lectured by the driverdroid on what little was known of the Sharu.

  “Master!” the droid cried behind him, scurrying to catch up “There was nothing I could do! I am specifically enjoined by my programming never to—”

  “Stow it!” Lando snorted, taking some visceral satisfaction in the terse, blue-collar monosyllables. He’d kept his back to Vuffi Raa this time, hadn’t even slackened his pace. The robot, with a sudden burst of speed made awkward by his master’s bags, slipped around Lando and stopped, blocking the young gambler’s further bad-tempered progress.

  “Sir, I am not programmed for violence. I cannot harm a sentient being, organic or mechanical, any more than you could flap your arms and fly from this planet.”

  “Which only goes to show,” Lando asserted, startled at the droid’s sudden insistent solemnity, “that
I was right in the first place.” He stepped around the robot and started walking again. “You’re useless.”

  “You are saying, then,” the robot’s voice inquired, very small, at the captain’s rapidly receding back, “that violence is the only solution to this problem, the only capability that is useful or desirable to you in a friend or companion?”

  Lando froze, one foot still in the air, stopped dead by the icy disgust he heard in Vuffi Raa’s voice. He set the foot down, turned slowly to face the machine. Not only was he arguing with an artifact—he was losing!

  Of course the little droid was right. Why else did he, Lando himself, insist on carrying nothing more than the minimal and miniscule weapon tucked away in his sash? Men of whatever species or construction acted with their minds, survived by their wits. Only a stupid brute would automatically limit himself to the resource of his fists or those of a friend.

  That stopped Lando a second time: just exactly when had he begun to consider Vuffi Raa his friend?

  “Well, Master,” Vuffi Raa mused, “as I understand the situation, you’re to search for whatever lock the Key may fit. Yet you haven’t any idea whether the lock—and it may be a more metaphorical than material entity—is even on this planet. Correct?”

  Lando nodded resignedly. He’d let three regular hoverbuses to the spaceport whistle past the stop while he carefully explained things to the droid.

  “You’ve got it, exactly as I just told it to you. So far, old lube-guzzler, you’ve proved your usefulness as a suitcase caddy and an audio recorder. Any more talents you haven’t revealed?”

  He shifted on the transit-stop bench so that his back was to the little robot. He wasn’t so much annoyed with Vuffi Raa for being useless, as for the fact that the automaton had forced him to confront some of his own failings.