David Weber - Empire from the Ashes

"We're a long way from crossing that bridge yet, Tam. Anyway, I'd prefer to do a personal recon on the ground before we make any plans."

"Perhaps," Brashan said, "but I fear you'll have a problem there." He changed the display image to a closeup from one of their approach opticals. "Observe a typical citizen of the Temple."

"Oy vey!" Sean sighed, and Sandy laughed at his disgusted tone. The image was far from clear, but the individual in it was perhaps a hundred and fifty centimeters tall, red-haired and blue-eyed—the complete antithesis of any of Israel 's human crew.

"Indeed," Brashan replied. "Obviously, I could never pass as anything other than an alien, but I fear the same is true of all of you in the Temple."

"Not necessarily," Sandy said, and Sean brightened as the image changed again. This time the man standing before him had dark hair. His eyes were brown, not the black of the old Imperial Race—or of Sean or Harriet, for that matter—but the newcomer stood just over a hundred seventy centimeters, far short of Sean's own towering height but getting closer.

"This," Sandy continued, "is a citizen of something called the Princedom of Malagor. It's one of the bigger national units—a bit larger, in fact, than the Kingdom of Aris, which contains the Temple—and it's just over the Cherist border from us. We've been watching it through our remotes, and I'd say the Malagorans are an independent sort. Malagor's very mountainous, even for North Hylar, and these seem to be typical, stiff-necked mountaineers, without a lot of nobles. Their hereditary ruler's limited to the title of 'prince,' and I'd guess there's a lot of local government, but that doesn't make them stay-at-homes. There's an historical maps section in our atlas, and there've been lots of battles in the Duchy of Keldark, which lies between Malagor and Aris. It looks like Malagor and Aris were probably political rivals and Aris came out on top because of the Temple."

"Not so good," Sean muttered. "If there's a tradition of hostility, trying to pass as Malagorans wouldn't exactly get us a red carpet in Aris."

"Perhaps not," Brashan said, "but consider: the Temple is the center of a world religion."

"Oho! Pilgrims!"

"Maybe, but let's not get carried away, Sean," Sandy cautioned. "Remember all of this is still guesswork."

"Understood. Can you bring your map back up?"

Sandy obliged, and Sean frowned as he stared at it. Israel lay hidden in the spine of the westernmost of North Hylar's major mountain ranges, while Aris lay to the east of an even higher range. Malagor occupied a rough, tumbled plateau between the two before they merged to form the craggy spine of the isthmus into South Hylar.

"I wish we had a line of sight to run remotes into the Temple," he muttered.

"Perhaps," Brashan replied. "On the other hand, our position puts the mountains between us and any surveillance systems the Temple might boast."

"True, true." Sean shook himself. "All right, Sandy. It looks to me like you guys are doing good. I'm impressed. But—"

"But what've we done for you lately?" She smiled, and he grinned back.

"More or less. We need to refine your data a lot before we poke our noses out. Would it help if we took a stealthed cutter over closer to the Temple and ran some additional remotes in on it?"

"Maybe." Sandy considered, then shook her head. "Nope, not yet. We're already pulling in more data than we can integrate, and I'd rather not risk running afoul of any on-site detection systems until we know more."

"Makes sense to me," Sean agreed. "That about it for now, then?"

"I'm afraid so. We've spotted a Church library in one of the towns just west of here, and Tam and I are going to run in a couple of remotes tonight. Harry and I may be able to develop something out of that."

Father Stomald kilted his blue robe above his knees and waded out into the icy holding pond to examine the new waterwheel. Folmak Folmakson, the millwright, fidgeted while he waited, and Stomald frowned. A priest must be eternally vigilant this close to the Valley of the Damned, especially with the Trial so recently past and the strange shooting star to remind him of his duties. At moments like this he was unhappily aware of his own youth, but, he reminded himself, a man need not be aged to hear God in his heart.

He sloshed up onto the bank of the millrace and peered down at the wheel. To be sure, it did look odd. Stomald had never heard of a wheel driven by water which fell from above rather than turning submerged paddles, but he could see several advantages. For one thing, it required much less water, and that meant it could run for far more of the year in drier regions. Lack of rain was seldom a problem in Malagor, but the new design's efficiency meant more wheels could be run with the same water supply even here.

He frowned again, listening to the creak of the wheel while he applied the Test. It was a particularly important task here, for Malagor's artisans had always been notoriously restive under Mother Church's injunctions, even since the Schismatic Wars. Indeed, he sometimes suspected they'd grown still more so since then... and he knew many of them still harbored dreams of Malagoran independence. Within the last six five-days alone, he'd heard no less than four people whistling the forbidden tune to "Malagor the Free," and he was deeply concerned over how he ought to respond to it. Yet he was relieved to note that this wheel, at least, didn't seem to violate any of the Tenets. It was powered by water and required the creation of no new tools or processes. It might be suspiciously innovative, but Stomald could see no demonic influence. It was still a water wheel, and those had been in use forever.

He banished his frown and replaced it with a properly meditative expression as he splashed back towards his anxious audience. He could, he decided, pronounce on this without bothering Bishop Frenaur, and that was a distinct relief. Like most senior prelates, the bishop was unhappy at being called away from the Temple for anything other than his twice-a-year pastoral visitation. Stomald didn't like to think how he might react if some village under-priest, especially a native-born Malagoran, suggested a special conclave was required, and the fact that Folmak hadn't introduced a single new technique gave him an out.

Which, Stomald thought a bit guiltily, might be fortunate in more ways than one. The new catechism suggested Mother Church was entering one of her more dogmatic periods, and some of the Inquisition's recent actions boded ill for Stomald's stubborn countrymen. Bishop Frenaur just might have felt compelled to make an example of Folmak.

He stepped out of the water, trying to hide an unpriestly shiver, and Folmak shifted from foot to foot, almost wringing his hands. The millwright was twice Stomald's age and more, and it struck the priest—not for the first time—how absurd it was for someone older than his own father to look at him so appealingly. He scolded himself—again, not for the first time—for the thought. Folmak wasn't looking to Stomald Gerakson for guidance; he was looking to Father Stomald of Cragsend, and Father Stomald spoke not from the authority of his own years but with that of Mother Church Herself.

"Very well, Folmak, I've looked at it," the young priest said. He paused, unable to resist the ignoble desire to cloak his pronouncement in mystery a moment longer, then smiled. "As far as I can tell, your contraption satisfies all the Tenets. If you'll walk to the vicarage with me, I'll fill out the Attestation right now."

A huge grin transfigured the millwright's bearded face. Stomald permitted himself to grin back, then clapped Folmak on one brawny shoulder, and the unsullied joy of serving his flock made him look even younger.