The transport device had to compensate for Allor and Ova together. It wasn’t a noticeable compensation, unless you examined the code that was running. The combined weight of the king and queen resulted in numerous sub-functions being run in order to adjust to the effect of additional weight on trajectory calculations. To the scientific mind, the additional two-tix delay before departure on the first journey was a telltale sign of the compensation. Fortunately, they weren’t standing at an airlock and jumping out, or else they might have experienced two tix of panic when nothing happened and they merely drifted out into space for a moment.
But they had arrived at Isla, the town in the middle of the great forest. It sat alone in a sea of trees. And as you would expect, the buildings were all of wood and sturdy. Even the people looked sturdy, as they all tended towards significant muscular development because the largest amount of work was in harvesting wood from the forest. “Saws,” as they were called, were the men and women that cut down the trees. They were easy to spot, as the sleeves of their shirts were short and had a zigzag pattern to the cut of the fabric at the end of the sleeves, like the pattern on the saws that they used.
“But if you are not a god, then what are you?” asked an old woman who could finally defecate without pain.
“I am a doctor,” Allor replied. “And your king.”
“I like you better as a king than a god. I never believed it anyway,” she replied.
“Good,” said Ova, and she handed the woman a gold coin.
“Come closer,” said Allor. “Let me explain,” he said as he raised the Remedium to the old woman’s head. It took a couple of tox before it was complete.
“Did we really come from the stars?” she asked him as she backed away from him, slightly frightened.
“A wise man once told me that asking for confirmation of things that I already know to be true is not my best line of questioning. Yes, we come from the stars.”
“And to think I have held my breath for over a thousand times. And for what? Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” the old woman said with disgust.
“You did it for reasons that you thought were good at the time,” replied Allor.
“I was a damned fool,” said the old woman.
“I was too,” said Ova. “I thought that the Cult of Niddler might be for me when I was young. I loved the pillows in their temples.”
“What can I do to help?” asked the old woman.
“Lead by example,” said Allor. “Help others.”
“I will,” said the old woman. She smiled at Allor and bowed to the king and queen before leaving back into the crowd that surrounded them.
They were treating a child that had been blind since birth. Ova was using the remedium for the first time. Deep in the crowd of hundreds surrounding them came a scream. It was followed a moment later by another one, then another. Allor responded by grabbing Ova’s hand and turning the shield to the high setting. He wasn’t ever completely certain it would work with two people inside of it, but he wasn’t going to let his new bride be at risk.
They held hands and pushed their way through the crowd until they found the round void space around the man with the long blade in his hand. At his feet were two people, one dead, another dying.
“Put down the sword,” Ova demanded.
The tall man with strong muscular arms responded by rushing towards them and bringing the sword down hard against the protective shell. His sword broke. He turned and ran away. He had gotten no more than maybe ten maatars from them when an arrow arrived at the base of his skull. It came out at his throat and he fell to the ground dead. From high up in one of the trees a man waved down to them.
“The high priest ordered me to follow you and report back to him,” yelled the man in the tree.
“Then come down and tell me what you will report,” replied Allor.
“Shall I kill him?” asked Ova quietly.
“No,” replied Allor. “But it’s good to know that we are being watched.”
“We should kill him,” replied Ova.
“No, my darling. You are nothing if not loyal,” said Allor. He put his arm around her waist as he dialed the PPS back to the minimum setting.
“Loyal as a mother swan, but more deadly,” she replied with a smile.
About fifty tox later a man brought his wife forward. She didn’t want to come with him and struggled against his grip. The large man was more than a match for his diminutive wife that he held in a bear hug as he approached Allor and Ova.
“Put her down,” said Ova in an annoyed voice.
“She is sick. Please heal her,” said the man with the big beard and large arms.
“No, I’m not sick. I’m just sick of you,” replied the small, pretty woman behind a dirty face.
“Then prove it to your queen. Let my machine show your good health. Do it for me, your queen. Or if you like, think of it like doing a favor for a friend.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” the woman said, and she moved forward to stand in front of Ova.
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” said the man.
“Is he your husband?” Ova asked the woman as she knelt down and began to scan the woman from her feet upwards. She looked over at Allor, who was helping a man with a shrunken arm.
“Yes. He took me from my father as soon as I became a woman,” said the woman.
Ova watched as the corns on the woman’s feet disappeared, then a chipped ankle bone as it reconstructed.
“She was a good wife, at first,” complained the man. “Now she hates me.”
“You killed the man I loved,” said the woman with a mean tone.
“You love another?” Ova asked.
“This monster’s brother,” she replied. “We’ve been in love since we were children. But my father traded me to the monster instead. I’m worth one square kilomaatar of prime forest.”
“I overpaid,” said the man.
“I am not a cow or a sheep or a horse. I am not for sale.”
“If I’d paid nothing, I would have still overpaid for you,” said the man. “My life is worse for you.”
“And mine for you. I wish you a long, slow, painful death for killing Apo.”
“Heal her,” pleaded the man. “I’ve never had a wife. I’ve only had three years of constant anger and humiliation at her hands.”
“Why are you still together?” asked Ova.
“Marriage is for life,” replied the man. He was about to add to this then realized he was going speak about Ceros law. Instead, he fell silent.
“Maybe it should not be,” said Ova.
“Nothing would make me happier,” said the man.
“You couldn’t measure my delight to be rid of you,” said the woman.
Ova watched the remedium correct some cancerous cells in the woman’s breasts. A moment later she began using the device on the woman’s head. The process was slow, and the progress bar for information transfer indicated as much.
“What is this?” asked the woman. “What is this?” she repeated. “What is happening to me?” she asked anxiously.
“Knowledge. Join me in knowing,” said Ova.
“I don’t understand. How?” asked the woman.
“Technology from the stars,” replied Ova.
When the scan was complete, the woman insisted that her husband also be scanned. It took a little longer to complete the scan on the husband. When it was done, he was silent for a few moments before he finally spoke.
“I’m sorry,” replied the husband, looking at his wife. “I should never have bought you. Or killed Apo. If you leave, you can take whatever you want. Or I will give you half of my land and build a house for you to live in.”
“And I am sorry,” said the wife. “I should have run away with Apo when he asked. I should not have made him try to murder you.”
“Is it true that we come from the stars?” asked the man.
“Yes,” said Ova. “It makes much more sense than the fables of our mothers and fathers.”
The large man looked down at the small, pretty woman.
“We have much to talk about,” he said to her with a smile.
“I know,” she said. And they began to walk away. “How much land do we own? In total?” she asked.
The king and queen ate dinner that night at the home of a carpenter, a man who had built his own home and many of those in the town. His wife was nervous at first until Ova took her aside for a few minutes. She wouldn’t tell Allor what was said.
Allor told them about his mother coming to their town to look at the golden masks of Nobbs, the prize possession of the richest man in Isla. He told the elaborate and comical story of his first attempt to steal the masks. The carpenter roared with laughter at the thought of a naked man swinging a sword trying to kill a momentarily visible Allor who thought he was invisible, and all before he had discovered the protective suit’s capabilities.
When Ova and Allor left to return to the temple, their hosts were given a scan, along with one for their livestock. Eight cows, seven pigs, eight chickens, nine sheep, and two goats. And thirteen cats. The capture of the pigs offered the carpenter and his wife much delight. Their king chasing a pig would be the story of their lifetime.