"Duration exists only in the eight worlds on the surface of the Matrix, Hansen," said Dowson in a sparkle of violet light. His curtained jar sat on the table at the head of the Prince of Simplain's couch. "Within, all times are one time."
Outside the richly-appointed tent, a draft mammoth shrieked to the moon and a dozen of her fellows echoed the call. From a lesser distance came another of the normal noises of an army in its marching camp: two gangs of servants raised their voices in a violent argument. There would be a riot unless nobles intervened quickly to damp down the anger.
"There aren't any guards posted," Hansen said glumly. "Venkatna could hit us with a hundred men, and there wouldn't be a Mirala Confederation left."
"Have some wine, Kommissar," North said, offering a ewer of agate glass. "Anyway, I've set guards. You needn't fear that we won't be able to escape into the Matrix if there's a surprise attack."
Because Dowson was present at this dinner in 'Lord Guest's' tent, North and Hansen served themselves. The chirp of female voices beyond a double curtain indicated that North traveled in the full state of a prince of the Southlands, with a harem as well as servants for all other bodily needs.
"What I'm afraid of," Hansen said, "is that there's no way this bunch of clowns can beat the imperial army."
His finger slid his cup of gold-mounted crystal a finger's breadth closer to his dinner companion, signaling North to pour. The serving table between the two dining couches was a round of mountain cedar; polished to bring out the prominent markings.
Very pretty if you liked that sort of thing; and Hansen did, more or less, though his mind didn't dwell on natural luxuries even when he didn't have a fight to prepare for.
"Win or lose," North said with harsh gusto. "It's more souls for us on the Final Day. We'll need them, Hansen."
"We will need," Dowson said in thoughts as cold as the Matrix, "more than we have. More than we can ever have, Captain."
"Excellent wine, this," North said as he swallowed the sip he had been savoring in his mouth. North wore the flowing silk robes suitable for a southern magnate and he reclined while dining, though there was gray ice in his eye wherever it fell. "It comes from estates of mine near Simplain."
Hansen drank without finesse. Wine and beer were generally safer than water in the inhabited regions of the Open Lands. And they had alcohol in them, which was usually a bad thing . . . but not always, and not just now.
"Are you afraid of it?" he asked abruptly. "Of the end?"
"Not necessarily the end, Commissioner," corrected lime-green thoughts expanding from beside the shrouded container. "The end for us, perhaps, and we see no farther than we live . . . but the Matrix may exist beyond the Final Day, though we no longer observe it."
The sizzle of an arc weapon brought the men to attention. Flickers of light beat through the tent's silken weave.
The light died. An amplified voice shouted. A camp marshal was putting down the servants' quarrel, using his arc as a baton of office to get attention.
North chuckled. "Have you viewed your own death, Hansen?" he asked playfully.
"I don't look forward," Hansen said. He slugged down the rest of his wine, then refilled the cup.
"There is no forward or back in the Matrix," Dowson said in a soft mauve whisper. "There is no duration, Commissioner."
"You're a god," North said harshly. He fixed Hansen with his good eye and the milky globe of the other. "You can either accept that—"
"I'm a man, Captain," Hansen said. "I live life as it comes, because the line of it's important even if duration isn't!"
"Yes, you're a man," North sneered. "And by acting like a man, you've brought to life the monster that Venkatna's empire now is, haven't you?"
Hansen suddenly relaxed and sank back on his couch. There was a bowl of fruit on the table. He took a peach from the bowl. He toyed with it instead of biting through the soft skin.
"I'm not denying my responsibility, North," Hansen said softly. "I'm here."
North laughed. "You've come here to die, Hansen," he gibed. "You don't think these clowns can win. You've said it yourself!"
"You're here too, North," Hansen replied. His voice was toneless and still soft, but his face muscles were settling into planes.
"Oh, I'm here, Kommissar," the one-eyed man said lightly. "And my arc will lift souls from Venkatna's army for my Searchers to reap, never fear. But I won't stand and die when the battle is hopelessly lost."
"You'll stand on the Day, Captain North," Dowson said.
Hansen quirked a smile toward the curtained brain.
"You could bring down Venkatna, Hansen," North offered persuasively.
He lifted the ewer and noted from the weight that it was empty. A wine-thief hung from the flared lip of a footed forty-liter jar behind him, but for the moment the tall god remained on his couch.
"You could tumble the whole kingdom—the Empire—into the sea," North continued. "Flood it, shatter it with earthquakes, scour it clean with volcanos. I'd let you, you know. There'll be other battles, other souls than these."
"Never souls enough, Captain . . . ," murmured a bubble of tangerine yellow from the jar.
"When I do what a man does . . . ," Hansen said. He spoke slowly because he was articulating a judgment that he had never before formed in words, even within his own mind. "I make mistakes, I misjudge side-effects. But I can't not act."
He took a bite of the peach and chewed it carefully. Juice ran from the corner of his mouth; he wasn't used to lying on his side as he ate.
North watched him, half smiling.
"If I use the powers that I have now," Hansen continued, "my judgment doesn't get better. I do more harm, and more harm yet if I try to straighten out that mess. So I won't do that. I'll use what I know."
He set the peach down on the table and flexed his right hand as if there were a gun in it. He smiled back, a wolf to North's craggy eagle, and stood up.
North's laughter boomed out.
"Very well, Kommissar," he said as he rose also. He looked even taller than usual as his head brushed the lamplit expanse of the tent roof. "You follow your devices, and I'll follow mine. Who knows? We may find ourselves at a similar point in the future—"
North stepped toward the room's internal wall.
"—if you survive," he added.
"Thanks for dinner," Hansen said. He considered a moment, then picked up the peach again to finish on his way to his own quarters.
"Unless . . . ," North said as he paused with the silk brocade curtain half-raised ". . . you'd perhaps like another sort of hospitality also? I have one along who looks a great deal like Krita, I believe."
Hansen looked at the taller man; and, very deliberately, took another bite of peach instead of answering. He walked out of the tent, past the pair of guards in battlesuits.
"Surely," North said musingly, "he doesn't think he can correct all injustice here on Northworld?"
"He thinks," replied a shimmer of peach-colored light, "that a man could do worse than try."
North thought of Hansen's expression as he left. His face had been composed, his mouth vaguely smiling.
But Hansen's eyes were pits of molten fury.