Olan Thorensen - Cast Under an Alien Sun

The abbot looked down at the papers on his desk, shook his head, and looked back up at Yozef. “I hope I answered your question about the Narthani. There’s not much else I can add, and I’m sorry, but I need to get back to all of this paper.”

“Thank you, Abbot. I appreciate your taking the time to talk with me. I’m afraid I agree with your worry and the hetman’s about the Narthani.”

Yozef walked to his room, his mind replaying the abbot’s words. The Narthani sounded like real pissers. He’d been so wrapped up in trying to adjust to here—to Abersford and the abbey complex—that he hadn’t thought about what was happening on a larger stage. What this all meant for him personally could be bad, if he got caught up in a war of conquest for Caedellium. Could whatever future he had, be with these Narthani, instead of the Caedelli?

Christ! After what happened to me, is it too much to be able to live quietly? Well, there’s nothing I can do about it. I only hope I don’t get directly involved.

It was to be a forlorn hope .

Yozef’s daily routine gradually altered during the next two Anyar months. He switched to mornings to accompany Carnigan at his work assignments. Language study changed to expanding vocabulary, tackling more advanced readings, and exposing himself to social situations, including attending the Keelan version of evening bible lessons, musical evenings, or a discussion or a lecture by one of the scholastics, all at the abbey.

The religious lessons gave Yozef a grasp of the Caedellium theology—a single God, who made the world and watched and judged but seldom intervened.

Sort of a monotheistic lite , he first thought.

Later lectures and discussions showed a more complex, evolving theology. The theophists at St. Sidryn’s saw a single God, who interacted with humans through three divine aspects: healing, wisdom, and discipline. From this view had developed the four Orders: theophists for humans’ obligations to God, medicants to heal, scholastics to know God’s creations, and militants to teach humans self-control. Details varied among and within clans, and more so elsewhere on Anyar, with variations on a single god, four separate gods, and hints of minor gods and entire pantheons.

The enemy of God was the Evil One, a version of Satan who tempted humans but who had no power over God. Yozef also read The Word of God , the holy book canonized a thousand years earlier, and The Commentaries , writings interpreting and extending the Word and which could still be added to. These writings were not universally accepted throughout Anyar, and there were allusions to past religious wars on the major continents.

The music evenings provided an interesting introduction to local music. None of the instruments had exact analogs on Earth, but some had similar tones, while others were weirdly novel for Yozef’s ear.

The scholastic evenings provided an opportunity to understand more complex aspects of the Caedelli language and intellectual discourse, meaning half of the time he had no idea what was being discussed.

Same here as on Earth, he often reminded himself. Scholastics anywhere could talk up a storm without saying anything.

The only times he left the abbey vicinity was once or twice a sixday when he visited Abersford with Carnigan. The village had a central square with official-looking structures, two perpendicular main streets filled with shops, and houses of various sizes, enough to account for the village’s population of nine hundred. The number of shops in Abersford surprised Yozef, until he realized the village drew business from ten or more miles away. The square, the main streets, and some side streets were cobblestone, with the rest of the streets covered by a mixture of gravel and crushed seashells. At the edge of the village, the roads turned to dirt—or mud, depending on the weather. The walls of the larger structures around the square and the more affluent-appearing houses were made of stone with slate roofs. Lesser structures were stone, wood, or a combination, with roofs of wood or thatch.

On those nights when Yozef accompanied Carnigan, they walked to the opposite side of the square, a block down the north-running main street, and turned a corner to Carnigan’s favorite pub. While there were two other pubs in the village, Carnigan patronized only the one he considered the best. Yozef went along with the choice, since Carnigan was paying. Yozef had no “coin,” as the locals referred to money, and he was obliged to agree with Carnigan’s opinion.

A day when Yozef’s life changed again came when he anticipated an evening with Carnigan at the pub. The first event of note that day occurred in the afternoon. He had taken time away from helping Carnigan to walk the gardens and the groves within the abbey complex, then exited the east gate to a nearby grove and came to his log. A major branch, some three feet in diameter, had split off a truly heroic tree whose canopy topped out at more than two hundred feet. The leaves seemed Earth-like, more rounded with serrated edges, instead of the slenderer leaves of Anyar trees, and of a familiar green, instead of the shadings from deep green to purple of most indigenous plants. He didn’t think the tree oak—maybe elm or chestnut. The log was partially decayed, just enough to be soft, without splinters, and shaped in a curve that fit his body. He could lie on the curvature and stare upward through the leaf-filtered light to the sky. The sound of the wind through the branches and the dancing of the leaves sometimes lulled him to sleep, but on this day, he thought about the future, as he had many times previously.

He repeatedly asked himself the same question, because he still didn’t have an answer. What am I going to do? The Caedelli at the abbey were gracious, understanding, and caring. However, there must be a limit to how long he could merely exist here. He might not be reading the signs correctly, but he got the feeling even the abbot was hinting about him finding a place in this society.

So. What could he do? He had no physical resources, none of the coins he saw others use, no experience or skills in trades or farming, and although he was communicating well, given everything, he was still far too ignorant of the culture and the histories of these people. This left . . . what?

“Knowledge,” he blurted out, switching from internal dialogue to speaking aloud to the trees and sky. “The answer that keeps coming back is my knowledge of chemistry and the other sciences. Within my brain is more knowledge of the physical universe than this entire planet will possess for centuries. There has to be a way to tap into that knowledge. A way that will provide a living for me and still let me avoid getting in too much trouble with local beliefs and superstitions.”

A problem was no infrastructure—the totality of knowledge, skills, and industry needed to use science from Earth. He knew the processes to make almost any, save the most complex, chemical compounds and molecules, but most required reaction ingredients, each of which might take a set of other ingredients to produce, and they in turn—on and on. Most would take decades or longer to develop, even under the best of circumstances.

Yet there must be simpler reactions and products he could start off with. He needed to speak with the abbey staff and troll the village shops for ideas. Between the two, he should be able to gauge the level of chemical knowledge and what chemicals were already available. There might also be books, even if not formal textbooks, in the abbey library that could at least give clues.

“Why haven’t I thought of this before? Maybe the accident, the Watchers and Harlie, being dumped on Anyar never to see Earth or hear English again, all stunned my brain more than I realized.”