The Burning City Read online

  THE BURNING

  CITY

  Larry Niven

  TALES OF KNOWN SPACE

  THE INTEGRAL TREES

  WORLD OF PTAVVS

  RINGWORLD

  PROTECTOR

  THE SMOKE RING

  N-SPACE

  PLAYGROUNDS OF THE MIND

  CRASHLANDER

  FLATLANDER

  THE RINGWORLD THRONE

  DESTINY’S ROAD

  RAINBOW MARS

  Jerry Pournelle

  JANISSARIES

  HIGH JUSTICE

  KING DAVID’S SPACESHIP

  EXILES TO GLORY

  RED HEROIN

  PRINCE OF MERCENARIES

  FALKENBERG’S LEGION

  STARSWARM

  Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle

  INFERNO

  OATH OF FEALTY

  THE MOTE IN GOD’S EYE

  LUCIFER’S HAMMER

  FOOTFALL

  THE GRIPPING HAND

  THE BURNING CITY

  Larry Niven & Steven Barnes

  DREAM PARK

  THE BARSOOM PROJECT

  THE CALIFORNIA VOODOO GAME

  DESCENT OF ANANSI

  ACHILLES’ CHOICE

  SATURN’S RACE

  Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle & Steven Barnes

  LEGACY OF HEOROT

  BEOWULF’S CHILDREN

  Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle & Michael Flynn

  FALLEN ANGELS

  Jerry Pournelle & Roland Green

  TRAN

  Jerry Pournelle & S. M. Stirling

  GO TELL THE SPARTANS

  PRINCE OF SPARTA

  Jerry Pournelle & Charles Sheffield

  HIGHER EDUCATION

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  Copyright © 2000 by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

  ISBN 978-1-4165-7508-5

  eISBN-13: 978-1-43912-018-7

  First Pocket Books hardcover printing March 2000 10 98765 4 321

  POCKET and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster Inc.

  Maps by Paul Pugliese

  Printed in the U.S.A.

  For Roberta and Marilyn

  Editor’s Acknowledgment

  The editor would like to thank Larry Niven

  and Jerry Pournelle for that rarest of all novels,

  one with something to say.

  “It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that

  butchers them or destiny that feeds them to

  the dogs. It’s us. Only us.”

  From Watchmen by Alan Moore

  CAST

  Gods

  YANGIN-ATEP (TEP, FIREBRINGER)

  ZOOSH

  COYOTE

  BEHEMOTH

  LOKI

  PROMETHEUS

  Lordkin

  Placehold

  WHANDALL PLACEHOLD (Seshmarl)

  POTHEFIT: Whandall’s father

  SHASTERN: Whandall’s younger brother

  SHIG: Whandall’s younger brother

  MOTHER’S MOTHER: Dargramnet

  WANSHIG: Whandall’s older half brother

  RESALET: Whandall’s father’s brother and leader of the Placehold

  WESS: a girl about Whandall’s age

  LENORBA

  VINSPEL

  ILYESSA: Whandall’s sister

  THOMER

  TOTTO

  TRIG: Whandall’s brother

  ELRISS

  RUBYFLOWER

  ILTHERN

  SHARLATTA

  FREETHSPAT

  Serpent’s Walk

  LORD PELZED

  GERAVIM

  TUMBANTON

  TRAZALAC

  STANT CORLES

  DUDDIGRACT

  RENWILDS

  COSCARTIN

  SHEALOS

  THE FORIGAFT BROTHERS

  KRAEMAR

  ROUPEND

  CHAPOKA

  MIRACOS

  HARTANBATH

  Other Bands

  BANSH

  ILTHER

  ALFERTH

  TARNISOS

  ILSERN: a tough, athletic woman

  CHIEF WULLTID

  IDREEPUCT

  FALCONS: called Dirty Birds by most but not to their faces

  STAXIR

  Kinless

  KREEG MILLER

  RIGMASTER

  WILLOW ROPEWALKER

  CARVER ROPEWALKER

  CARTER ROPEWALKER

  HAMMER MILLER

  IRIS MILLER

  HYACINTH MILLER

  OPAL MILLER

  DREAM-LOTUS INNKEEP

  Lords

  LORD CHIEF WITNESS SAMORTY

  LORD CHANTHOR

  LORD QIRINTY: a lord fascinated by magic

  LADY RAWANDA: first lady of lordshills

  LORD JERREFF

  SHANDA

  RABBLIE (LORD RABILARD)

  LORD QUINTANA: later becomes Lord Chief Witness

  MORTH OF ATLANTIS

  LORD QUIRINTHAL THE FIRST

  ROWENA

  LADY SIRESEE

  Their Servants

  SERANA: a cook; later, chief cook

  ANTANIO

  BERTRANA (MISS BATTY): governess

  PEACEVOICE WATERMAN

  Turf

  PLACEHOLD

  SERPENT’S WALK

  PEACEGIVEN SQUARE

  BULL PIZZLE

  FALCON LAIR: generally called Dirty Bird

  THE WEDGE: the meadow at the top of Deerpiss River

  CONDIGEO

  LORD’S TOWN

  THE LORDSHILLS

  WOLVERINES

  TEP’S TOWN (VALLEY OF SMOKES, BURNING CITY)

  WATER DEVILS

  SANVIN STREET: winds over the low hills that separate Serpent’s Walk from the harbor

  THE BLACK PIT

  ATLANTIS

  BARBAR MOUNTAINS

  TOROV

  MAZE WALKERS

  EASTERN ARC

  GOOD HAND HARBOR

  OWL BEAK

  MARKET ROUND

  SERPENT STREET

  COLDWATER

  DARK MAN’S CUP STREET

  DEAD TOWN

  THE TORONEXTI

  LION’S ATTIC

  STRAIGHT STREET

  ANGLE STREET

  Lookers

  TRAS PREETROR

  ARSHUR THE MAGNIFICENT

  Seamen

  JACK RIGENLORD

  ETIARP

  MANOCANE

  SABRIOLOY

  Water Devils

  LATTAR

  Beyond Tep’s Town

  Turf

  FIREWOODS TOWN

  WALUU PORT

  THE HEMP ROAD

  MOUNT JOY

  PARADISE VALLEY

  STONE NEEDLES

  GORMAN

  GOLDEN VALLEY

  LAST PINES

  MARSYL TOWN

  ORANGETOWN

  COYOTE’S DEN

  GREAT HAWK BAY

  Clan Members and Others

  SPOTTED COYOTES

  RORDRAY

  BLACK KETTLE (KETTLE BELLY)

  NUMBER THREE

  NUMBER FOUR

  HAJ FISHHAWK
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  RUBY FISHHAWK

  ORANGE BLOSSOM

  BISON CLAN

  MIRIME

  LONESOME CROW

  GREATHAND: the blacksmith

  HICKAMORE

  FAWN

  MOUNTAIN CAT

  STARFALL

  RUTTING DEER

  TWISTED CLOUD

  STAG RAMPANT

  Book Two

  Turf

  ROAD’S END

  DEAD SEAL FLATS

  GRANITE KNOB

  LONG AVENUE

  NORTH QUARTER

  NEW CASTLE

  HIGH PINES

  GREAT VALLEY

  RORDRAY’S ATTIC

  MOUNT CARLEM

  WARBLER FLATS

  DRYLANDS

  FARTHEST LAND

  STONE NEEDLES

  MINTERL

  CASTLE MINTERL

  HIP HIGH SPRING

  VEDASIRAS RANGE

  FAIR CHANCE

  THE ESTATES

  CARLEM MARCLE

  NEO WRASELN

  QUAKING ASPEN

  THE SPRINGS

  Travelers

  WHANDALL FEATHERSNAKE

  GREEN STONE

  LARKFEATHERS

  SABER TOOTH

  CHIEF FARTHEST LAND

  HAWK IN FLIGHT

  WOLF TRIBE

  MOUNTAIN CAT

  SESHMARLS THE BIRD

  TERROR BIRDS

  LILAC

  WHITECAP MOUNTAIN

  PUMA TRIBE

  PASSENGER PIGEON

  THONE

  KING TRANIMEL

  GLINDA

  DREAM OF FLYING

  WHITE LIGHTNING

  STONE NEEDLES MAN (CATLONY, TUMBLEWEED, HERMIT)

  HIDDEN SPICE

  CLEVER SQUIRREL (SQUIRRELLY)

  LURK (NOTHING WAS SEEN)

  STARFALL ROPEWALKER

  FIGHTING CAT FISHHAWK

  BURNING TOWER

  INSOLENT LIZARD

  FALLEN WOLF

  Returning

  HALF HAND

  EGON FORIGAFT

  MASTER PEACEVOICE WATERMAN

  LORD CHIEF WITNESS QUINTANA

  WITNESS CLERK SANDRY

  ADZ WEAVER

  FUBGIRE

  RONI

  HEROUL

  FIREGIFT

  SILLY RABBITS

  SADESP

  LEATHERSMITH MILLER (SMITTY)

  SAPPHIRE CARPENTER

  SWABOTT

  REBLAY OF SILLY RABBITS

  HEJAK

  LAGDRET

  PREFACE

  There was fire on Earth before the fire god came. There has always been fire. What Yangin-Atep gave to humankind was madness. Yangin-Atep’s children will play with fire even after they burn their fingers.

  It was only Yangin-Atep’s joke, then and for unmeasured time after. But a greater god called down the great cold, and Yangin-Atep’s joke came into its own. In the icy north people could not survive unless the fire god favored one of their number.

  Cautious men and women never burned themselves twice; but their people died of the cold. Someone must tend the fire during the terrible winters. Twelve thousand years before the birth of Christ, when most of the gods had gone mythical and magic was fading from the world, Yangin-Atep’s gift remained.

  BOOK ONE

  WHANDALL PLACEHOLD

  PART ONE

  Childhood

  CHAPTER

  1

  They burned the city when Whandall Placehold was two years old, and again when he was seven.

  At seven he saw and understood more. The women waited with the children in the courtyard through a day and a night and another day. The day sky was black and red. The night sky glowed red and orange, dazzling and strange. Across the street a granary burned like a huge torch. Strangers trying to fight the fire made shadow pictures.

  The Placehold men came home with what they’d gathered: shells, clothing, cookware, furniture, jewelry, magical items, a cauldron that would heat up by itself. The excitement was infectious. Men and women paired off and fought over the pairings.

  And Pothefit went out again with Resalet, but only Resalet came back.

  Afterward Whandall went with the other boys to watch the loggers cutting redwoods for the rebuilding.

  The forest cupped Tep’s Town like a hand. There were stories, but nobody could tell Whandall what was beyond the forest where redwoods were pillars big enough to support the sky, big enough to replace a dozen houses. The great trees stood well apart, each guarding its turf. Lesser vegetation gathered around the base of each redwood like a malevolent army.

  The army had many weapons. Some plants bristled with daggers; some had burrs to anchor seeds in hair or flesh; some secreted poison; some would whip a child across the face with their branches.

  Loggers carried axes, and long poles with blades at the ends. Leather armor and wooden masks made them hard to recognize as men. With the poles they could reach out and under to cut the roots of the spiked or poisoned lesser plants and push them aside, until one tall redwood was left defenseless.

  Then they bowed to it.

  Then they chopped at the base until, in tremendous majesty and with a sound like the end of the world, it fell.

  They never seemed to notice that they were being watched from cover by a swarm of children. The forest had dangers for city children, but being caught was not one of them. If you were caught spying in town you would be lucky to escape without broken bones. It was safer to spy on the loggers.

  One morning Bansh and Ilther brushed a vine.

  Bansh began scratching, and then Ilther; then thousands of bumps sprouted over Ilther’s arm, and almost suddenly it was bigger than his leg. Bansh’s hand and the ear he’d scratched were swelling like nightmares, and Ilther was on the ground, swelling everywhere and fighting hard to breathe.

  Shastern wailed and ran before Whandall could catch him. He brushed past leaves like a bouquet of blades and was several paces beyond before he slowed, stopped, and turned to look at Whandall. What should I do now? His leathers were cut to ribbons across his chest and left arm, the blood spilling scarlet through the slashes.

  The forest was not impenetrable. There were thorns and poison plants, but also open spaces. Stick with those, you could get through… it looked like you could get through without touching anything… almost. And the children were doing that, scattering, finding their own paths out.

  But Whandall caught the screaming Shastern by his bloody wrist and towed him toward the loggers, because Shastern was his younger brother, because the loggers were close, because somebody would help a screaming child.

  The woodsmen saw them—saw them and turned away. But one dropped his ax and jogged toward the child in zigzag fashion, avoiding… what? Armory plants, a wildflower bed—

  Shastern went quiet under the woodsman’s intense gaze. The woodsman pulled the leather armor away and wrapped Shastern’s wounds in strips of clean cloth, pulling it tight. Whandall was trying to tell him about the other children.

  The woodsman looked up. “Who are you, boy?”

  “I’m Whandall of Serpent’s Walk.” Nobody gave his family name.

  “I’m Kreeg Miller. How many—”

  Whandall barely hesitated. “Two tens of us.”

  “Have they all got”—he patted Shastern’s armor—“leathers?”

  “Some.”

  Kreeg picked up cloth, a leather bottle, some other things. Now one of the others was shouting angrily while trying not to look at the children. “Kreeg, what do you want with those candlestubs? We’ve got work to do!” Kreeg ignored him and followed the path as Whandall pointed it out.

  There were hurt children, widely scattered. Kreeg dealt with them. Whandall didn’t understand, until a long time later, why other loggers wouldn’t help.

  Whandall took Shastern home through Dirty Birds to avoid Bull Pizzles. In Dirty Birds a pair of adolescent Lordkin would not let them pass.

>   Whandall showed them three gaudy white blossoms bound up in a scrap of cloth. Careful not to touch them himself, he gave one to each of the boys and put the third away.

  The boys sniffed the womanflowers’ deep fragrance. “Way nice. What else have you got?”

  “Nothing, Falcon brother.” Dirty Birds liked to be called Falcons, so you did that. “Now go and wash your hands and face. Wash hard or you’ll swell up like melons. We have to go.”

  The Falcons affected to be amused, but they went off toward the fountain. Whandall and Shastern ran through Dirty Birds into Serpent’s Walk. Marks and signs showed when you passed from another district to Serpent’s Walk, but Whandall would have known Serpent’s Walk without them. There weren’t as many trash piles, and burned-out houses were rebuilt faster.

  The Placehold stood alone in its block, three stories of gray stone. Two older boys played with knives just outside the door. Inside, Uncle Totto lay asleep in the corridor where you had to step over him to get in. Whandall tried to creep past him.

  “Huh? Whandall, my lad. What’s going on here?” He looked at Shastern, saw bloody bandages, and shook his head. “Bad business. What’s going on?”

  “Shastern needs help!”

  “I see that. What happened?”

  Whandall tried to get past, but it was no use. Uncle Totto wanted to hear the whole story, and Shastern had been bleeding too long. Whandall started screaming. Totto raised his fist. Whandall pulled his brother upstairs. A sister was washing vegetables for dinner, and she shouted too. Women came yelling. Totto cursed and retreated.

  Mother wasn’t home that night. Mother’s Mother—Dargramnet, if you were speaking to strangers—sent Wanshig to tell Bansh’s family. She put Shastern in Mother’s room and sat with him until he fell asleep. Then she came into the big second-floor Placehold room and sat in her big chair. Often that room was full of Placehold men, usually playful, but sometimes they shouted and fought. Children learned to hide in the smaller rooms, cling to women’s skirts, or find errands to do. Tonight Dargramnet asked the men to help with the injured children, and they all left so that she was alone with Whandall. She held Whandall in her lap.