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H. Beam PiperDown Styphon!The last story Beam Piper finishedbefore his death—another tale of thePennsylvania State Trooper thrown onhis own in another time-line.With one great advantage—he knewmilitary history those folks never heard of!Illustrated by Kelly FreasIn the quiet of the Innermost Circle, in Styphon’s House Upon Earth, the great image looked down, and Sesklos, Supreme Priest and Styphon’s Voice, returned the carven stare as stonily. Sesklos did not believe in Styphon, or in any other god; if he had, he would not be sitting here. The policies of Styphon’s House were too important to entrust to believers. The image, he knew, was of a man—the old high priest who, by discovering the application of a half-forgotten secret, had taken the cult of a minor healer-god out of its mean back-street temples and made it the power that ruled the rulers of all the Five Great Kingdoms. If it had been in Sesklos to worship anything, he would have worshiped that man’s memory.And now, the first Supreme Priest looked down upon the last one. He lowered his eyes, flattened the parchment on the table in front of him, and read again:PTOSPHES, Prince of Hositgos, to SESKLOS, calling himself Styphon’s Voice, these:False priest of a false god, impudent swindler, liar and cheat! Know that we in Hostigos, by simple mechanic arts, now make for ourselves that fireseed which you pretend to be the miracle of your fraudulent god, and that we propose to teach these arts to all, that hereafter Kings and Princes minded to make war may do so for their own defense and advancement, and not to the enrichment of Styphon’s House of Iniquities.In proof thereof, we send you fireseed of our own make, enough for twenty musket charges, and set forth how it is made, thus:To three parts of refined saltpeter add three fifths of one part of charcoal and two fifths of one part of sulfur, all ground to the fineness of bolted wheat flour. Mix these thoroughly, moisten the mixture and work it to a heavy dough, then press the dough to cakes and dry them, and when they are dry, grind and sieve them.And know that we hold you and all in Styphon’s House of Iniquities to be our mortal enemies, and the enemies-general of all men, to be dealt with as Wolves are, and that we will not rest content until Styphon’s House of Iniquities is utterly cast down and ruined.PTOSPHESThat had been the secret of the power of Styphon’s House. No ruler, Great King or petty lord, could withstand his enemies if they had fireseed and he had none. Given here, armies marched to victory; withheld there, terms of peace were accepted. In every council of state, Styphon’s House had spoken the deciding word. Wealth had poured in, to be lent out at usury and return more wealth.And now, the contemptible prince of a realm a man could ride across without tiring his horse was bringing it down, and Styphon’s House had provoked him to it. There were sulfur springs in Hostigos, and of Styphon’s Trinity, sulfur was hardest to get. When the land around the springs had been demanded of him, Ptosphes had refused, and since none could be permitted to defy Styphon’s House, his enemy, Prince Gormoth of Nostor, had been raised against him, with subsidies to hire mercenaries and gifts of fireseed. When Gormoth had conquered Hostigos, he was pledged to give the sulfur springs to Styphon’s House. Things like that were done all the time.But now, Ptosphes was writing thus, to Styphon’s Voice Himself. For a moment, the impiety of it shocked Sesklos. Then he pushed aside Ptosphes’ letter and looked again at the one from Vyblos, the high priest of the temple at Nostor Town. Three moons ago, a stranger calling himself Kalvan and claiming to be an exiled prince from a far country—the boast of every needy adventurer—had appeared in Hostigos. A moon later, Ptosphes had made this Kalvan commander of his soldiers, and had set guards on all the ways out of Hostigos, allowing any to enter but none to leave. He had been informed of that at the time, but had thought nothing of it.Then, six days ago, the Hostigi had captured Tarr-Dombra, the castle guarding Gormoth’s easiest way into Hostigos. The castellan, a Count Pheblon, cousin to Gormoth, had been released on ransom-oath, with a letter to Gormoth in which Ptosphes had offered peace and friendship and the teaching of fire-seed making. A priest of Styphon, a black-robe believer, who had been at the castle, had also been released, to bear Ptosphes’ letter of defiance to him.It had, of course, been the stranger, Kalvan, who had taught Ptosphes’ people the fireseed secret. He wondered briefly if he could be a renegade from Styphon’s House. No; only yellow-robe priests of the Inner Circle knew the full secret as Ptosphes had written it, and had one of these absconded, the news would have reached him as swiftly as galloping relays of horses could bring it. Some Inner Circle priest could have written it down, a thing utterly forbidden, and the writing fallen into unconsecrated hands, but he questioned that. The proportions were different, more saltpeter and less charcoal. He would have Ptosphes’ sample tried; it might be better than their own.A man, then, who had re-discovered the secret? That could be, though it had taken many years and many experiments to perfect the processes, especially the caking and grinding. He shrugged. That was not important; the important thing was that the secrecy was broken. Soon anyone could make fireseed, and then Styphon’s House would be only a name, and a name of mockery.Perhaps, though, he could postpone the end for as long as mattered. He was near his ninetieth year; soon he would die, and for each man, when he dies, the world ends.Letters of urgency to the Arch-priests of the five Great Temples, telling them all. A story to be circulated among the secular rulers that fireseed, stolen by bandits, was being smuggled and sold. Prompt investigation of all stories of anyone collecting sulfur or saltpeter or building or altering grinding mills. Immediate death by assassination for anyone suspected of knowing the secret.And, of course, destruction of Hostigos; none in it to be spared, even for slavery. Gormoth had been waiting until his crops were harvested; he must be made to strike now. And as Archpriest of Styphon’s House Upon Earth to Nostor, this was quite beyond poor Vyblos’ capacities, with more silver, and fireseed and arms, for Gormoth.He glanced again at Vyblos’ letter. A copy of Ptosphes’ letter to him had been sent to Gormoth; why, then, Gormoth knew the fire-seed secret himself! It had been daring, and fiendishly clever, of Ptosphes to give this deadly gift to his enemy.And with the archpriest, fifty mounted Guardsmen of the Temple, their captain to be an Inner Circle priest without robe, and more silver to corrupt Gormoth’s nobles and his mercenary captains.And a special letter to the high priest of the temple at Sask Town. It had been planned to use Prince Sarrask of Sask as a counterpoise to Gormoth, when Gormoth had grown too mighty by the conquest of Hostigos. The time for that was now. Gormoth was needed to destroy Hostigos; then he, too, must be destroyed, before he began making fireseed in Nostor.He struck the gong thrice, and as he did he thought again of the mysterious Kalvan. That was nothing to shrug off; it was important to learn whence he had come before he appeared—he was intrigued by Vyblos’ choice of that word—in Hostigos, and with whom he had been in contact. He could have come from some distant country, in which fireseed was commonly made by all. He knew of none such, but it could well be that the world was larger than he thought.Or could there be other worlds? The idea had occurred to him, now and then, as an idle speculation.It was one of those small late-afternoon gatherings, with nobody seeming to have a care in the world, lounging indolently, smoking, sipping tall drinks, nibbling canapes, talking and laughing. Verkan Vall, who would be Chief of Paratime Police after Year-End Day, flicked his lighter and held it for his wife, Hadron Dalla, then applied it to his own cigarette. Across the low table, Tortha Karf, the retiring chief, was mixing another drink, with the concentrated care of an alchemist compounding the Elixir of Life. The Dhergabar University people—the elderly gentleman who was head of the department of Paratemporal Theory, the lady who was professor of Outtime History (IV), and the young man who was director of out-time study operations—were all smiling like three pussycats at a puddle of spilled milk.“You’ll have it all to yourselves,” he told them. “The Paratime Commission has declared that time-line a study area, and it’s absolutely quarantined to everybody but University personnel and accredited students. And five adjoining, near-identical, time-lines for comparison study. And I will make it my personal business to see that the quarantine is rigidly enforced.”Tortha Karf looked up. “After I retire, I’ll have a seat on the Commission, myself,” he said. “I’ll make it my business to see that the quarantine isn’t revoked or diluted.”“I wish we could account for those four hours after he was caught in the transposition field and before he came to that peasant’s farm,” the paratemporal theorist fretted. “We have no idea what he was doing.”“Wandering in the woods, trying to orient himself,” Dalla said. “I’d say, sitting and thinking, for a couple of hours, trying to figure out what happened to him. A paratemporal shift like that is a pretty shattering experience for an outtimer. I don’t think he was changing history all by himself, if that’s what you’re worrying about.”“You can’t say that,” the paratemporal theor...
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