Attanasio, AA - In Other Worlds

The interior had the walnut smell of autumn and a soft sheen of woodsmoke. Sheets of light hung from slit windows in the tent roof. The long hall looked as busy as a bazaar, yet the sound level mimed a temple.

Carl was led swiftly as his ponderous legs could keep up through the silky warmth, past curtained stalls of conversing people-office, food stalls, gamerooms--till they came to a stall with only one man in it. He was dressed in black and stood out boldly against the intricate cloud tapestry behind him.

The others regarded him deferentially, and Allin greeted him as wizan. "He speaks the language, sir. Perfectly."

"Is that so?" The wizan appeared younger than any of them: His immaculately groomed features seemed mild as amber.

"Yes," Carl replied. "An eld skyle imprinted it in my brain. Then I was sent to the Foke in a thornwing. It's the craziest thing that's ever happened to me-'

"Yes," the wizan cut him off, "the eld skyles are sometimes helpful in those ways." He was seated on a cushion, still and square as a Mayan icon. "You don't look much like a Foke, but you are clearly human and strong-looking at that. From where did the eld skyle take you?"

"I'm from the planet called earth." The words felt like tinsel in his mouth. "It existed a long time ago."

"What position did you have in your world?"

Carl couldn't find the words businessman or bartender in the Foke language. "I was a trader and brewseller."

The wizen sighed softly with disappointment.

"He's just a dropping that knows how to talk," Allin said.

"He's not useful. I sensed that when we found. him, but the others insisted that he be brought here. On the way, seven of ours were killed. A zotl

jumpship. I've passed the location along and a strike force is on the way."

The wizan silenced him with a limp wave. "What is your name?" he asked Carl.

"Carl."

"Carl, do you want to stay with us?"

"The eld skyle sent me to you," Carl answered. "He warned me about the zotl and gumper hogs and blood beetles and told me that you could teach me how to survive here. I'd really appreciate that."

"I'm sure you would," the wizen -acknowledged. "But our ranks are closed. There are other human communities in the Werld. Rhene is a city where someone like you would be much happier."

"I would still prefer to stay here."

"Then you must demonstrate your usefulness to the Foke." The wizan's voice teetered on boredom. "What skills does a trader and a brewseller have?"

can learn."

"Tarfeather is not a school." The black bits of his eyes drilled Carl. "Can you make plastique? Can you' ride the fallpath? Can you even tell time?" His eyes hooded, and he went into a rote routine: As a wizan of the Foke, I find you unacceptable for inclusion in our ranks by reason of your inutility-"

"I can work," Carl objected. "I'll do labor."

"We all work, Carl," he explained, his voice a scaly integument. "There are no laborers. We share responsibility for labor equally"

"I'm sure I'm good for something." Carl didn't want to start off his new life by thwarting the eld skyle's will: He wanted the Foke to accept him. Allin was grinning lushly, and Carl knew that whatever pleased Allin was no good for him.

"Is there a court of appeal?"

"No, my review is sufficient," the wizan replied in a voice of ravening flatness. "I order that you be taken directly to Rhene and traded for imprisoned Foke or sold for manufactured goods. Away-away."

Carl let himself be dragged out of the stall. Allin strode beside him, kicked him into a walk, and leered with satisfaction. The blue-robed guards followed to the exit.

"What is Rhene?" Carl asked at the doorway.

"You speak Foke and you don't know of Rhene?" He slapped Carl on the back and pushed him out of the wizan tent.

The beauty of the blued clouds and dark skyles had an unearthliness that made Carl shiver. "Is Rhene a prison city?"

Allin allowed himself a black laugh. "You were the reason ,my friends died, dropping. I'd just as soon imprison you as flay and gut you. But I am a Foke. ,We don't have penalties or prisons. Just exclusion."

He motioned Carl toward a steep trail that mounted a sinuous, reptilian terrain to the giant log moorings of a sky barge. The barge was a sleek wooden craft with a needle prow and furled black sail-fins.

"Rhene," Allin explained, "is a zotl-built city for people-their favorite food. You might say it's a farm. Because it exists, we are spared the zotl hunt."

"You said Rhene wasn't a prison," Carl reminded him.

"It isn't," he answered.

"Then what keeps the people inside?"

"The people are free to come and go. But going isn't really a hope for most of them."-He gestured at the yawn 4 purpling sky and the skyles that cluttered space like motes of dust. "The cloudlanes, the fallpaths, and the skyles, that is the home of the Foke. But most of the people, in Rhene would not survive to their next meal out here. They are content with their busy lives in the city. The zotl androbs do most of the manual

work and the people are free to cavort with one another. The only price they must pay is the lottery"

"I get a bad feeling from that word."

"When the zotl need to feast, they conduct a lottery. The one percent who lose are eaten. If you survive seven lotteries, your name is permanently removed from the risk. Many people find the seven percent odds of losing more attractive than struggling for existence all the time out here. Isn't that really the way with you?'

They had come to the boarding ramp of the barge, where Foke bustled to load the hold with crates of blue cabbages. The sweet citron fragrance of the vegetable swirled in the air.

Unbidden, the thought rose to Carl's mind that those were dream boles, a muscularly euphoric hallucinogen.

"There are great pleasures in the Werld," Allin said with a chill in his voice.

"Yeah, well, where I come from, the greatest pleasure is to be free:"

Surprise ticked across Allin's face. He gripped Carl's beard and shook his head once. "Then why are you so obedient to fear?" He shoved Carl up the ramp. "Go on, get on board, dropping."

Carl boarded the ship and was steered by-Allin's firm hand to a foredeck cabin. A dozen Foke sat on the benches that extended from the hull's ribs. They were conversing and staring out of the port visors at the scaffolding being slanted to slide the sky barge off the mountain and into the cloudy flightlanes.

Allin and Carl sat with them until the barge jolted, tilted, and sledded into the sky.

"Do you know how this works?" Carl asked, after the barge had bucked violently and rocked into the steady sway of its cruise.

"Don't gad me with your questions, dropping." He swung to his feet. "Let's eat."

Carl's first full meal was braised cloud trout on a bed of butter-seared owlroot. He learned then that the Foke's fondest pleasure was eating. They were magical cooks and robust eaters.

Their food was more diverse than anything he could remember of his older life.

That journey with Allin to Rhene lasted eighteen meals, no two alike, each almost supernaturally savory. During the flight, Carl learned enough about the Werld to -actually think he might be happy in Rhene. The Foke were a dour, hardworking people, but they were convivial when they cooked or ate. Food, or course, was free, and all were happy to display their culinary skills for Carl, even though he was a dropping.

Not having Allin's reason for hating him, the Foke were indifferent to his origin and fate: Droppings were common.

But praise among the Foke was not, and they were pleased by his laudations of their cooking prowess. Soon he was accepted among them.

Between meals, people slept casually and took turns helping with chores. Carl was started off cleaning latrines, but after his poetic praise of Foke cuisine had won him friends, hewas relieved of the odious chores some of the time and allowed to work on deck.