Stardogs, page 21
For a minute Shari panicked. The last time the shovelnosed creatures had fled, the geyser had erupted. But after a moment she realized that this was no wild and desperate flight. Instead it had a hum-drum Monday-morning commute feel about it. She shushed Otto, who had made several hopeful predatory leaps into the air, now that he could see what made the noise.
So, up that wall was the way out. She walked across to it, splashing into the shallow pool. It was steep, but not unclimbable. She looked back. Deo was sitting up, looking into the light.
CHAPTER 16
RETURNS
Be wary about rooting out dead plants. It may just have been winter.
The Upanishad of the Gardener-Dewa Celine.
The living we can part ourselves from. But our dead are always with us.
From the Liturgy for the passage of all souls: Memorium for the dead.
The capabilities of the mind of the rat are generally overestimated by the animals’ adherents. Yes, they are capable of a degree of feral sharpness, but, generally speaking, the thinking of fat and pampered long-domesticated creatures like Rat doesn’t go much beyond dinner, warmth and comfort, and occasional problems with constipation. Now Rat was having to deal with his master, who had always provided, being unresponsive to numerous suggestive nosings. Juan just moaned and muttered. Eventually Rat had had to gnaw his own way into the zippered pocket full of cirrith-seed. The high oil content could at least be broken down to provide some water. The pocket made a reasonable nest, even if he wished Juan would stop tossing and turning so much.
It was the afternoon of the next day before Juan returned briefly to semi-lucidity: Crown-induced semi-lucidity: Denaari-Juan only, left in confused control of an alien body that would not, could not, fly. He was not aided by Human-Juan, who was still muttering and wrestling in the confused realms of adolescent reality, which is bad enough without added delirium. Despite this, the body of the boy with a crown emerged from its hole and began crawling upstream. Parts of his mind wandered further afield and would occasionally try to make his body attempt null g-ball or low-g acrobatics, and address long diatribes to his father…
Rat accepted movement as part of his norm. He didn’t know that the tiny transmitter-chip which was part of every station-pet’s life was causing all sorts of upset with the Sector civil defense biocomputer unit. When the micro-transmitter started to move yet again, now heading into security zone, the biocomputer stopped vacillating and opened ancient transmission relays.
The cave-wall cliff was climbable. It was persuading Deo that he wanted to climb it that was difficult. At least he seemed more lucid and coherent now that he had slept. His recollection even of yesterday was hazy, but at least he seemed prepared to deal with today. He seemed prepared to deal with it in a typical Deo fashion: suspiciously and cautiously. If she had not been so hurt and angered by what she’d found in his collection of drugs and potions, if she had not been so anxious to get out into the sunlight again, she would have been glad that he was no longer so robotic. As it was, it was a pain that he wouldn’t just take orders. Eventually she had to resort to entering his confused world to tell him what to do. It seemed she was the Dewa again. She was not sure who she had sent him to kill this time.
Then there was Otto. He was not designed for rock-climbing. And he was not very keen on being stowed in Deo’s makeshift pack, which Shari had appropriated. The man showed no signs of being aware that he’d carried it before. Then the lumitube had begun to die. She had to ask Deo for another one. This he produced with a faint look of puzzlement, as if his hands knew what to do without his mind understanding it. At length, after a last drink and making sure that all the water-bottles were full, they climbed.
Shari realised how lucky they’d been to fall into the mass of the bat-creatures. It was a long way, especially with a heavy pack and a small dog that kept threatening to wriggle out of it. She was afraid that the pseudobats would come back. The fall without the furry creatures as flying cushions would probably kill them. But they reached the top, and then managed the short scramble to the niche into the main passage. Although all she wanted to do was run for the outside, Shari paused for long enough to mark the little cave-crack she’d come out of. Then, pushing Deo occasionally, and with Otto scampering eagerly ahead, she hastened up the tunnel and towards the outside. The cave was breathing in now, warm, dry late afternoon air. Soon they were out in the canyon. Never had daylight looked so beautiful.
Otto barked excitedly and Shari couldn’t restrain a yell of pure delight. Deo looked alarmed and confused. They began walking up the canyon in the deep late afternoon shadows. The rest of the party must be far ahead by now. She wondered, briefly, if they’d have left her pack.
Blood seeped sluggishly from Juan’s abraded knees and palms. He just kept going. Even the failing light and the night-cooling didn’t stop his slow, mechanical progress. The canyon walls kept him going in roughly the same direction. Upwards. Towards where the last of a precious supply of wood-fragments was being burned to gratify the new Lord and Master.
He looked at the women with an unpleasant hunger in his eyes. He was too insensitive to realize that they were aware of his lascivious gaze. He was too confident of his power over their life and death to understand that to ordinary mortals there are some things which are more important than mere life and death.
As the first moon began to rise over the canyon rim he’d reached his decision. The girl. The ridergirl. She looked so scared and vulnerable, that just looking at her aroused him. As a prince of the blood any number of aristocratic ladies and a few men, in case his preferences should run that way, had pursued him since puberty. They’d shown him that courtiers were merely courtesans by another name. They bored him, and, he always secretly suspected they despised him, despite the flattery they heaped on his efforts. His preference ran instead to the young and weak. To servants and chambermaids who might have wished to say him nay.
The others could wait. They were all his. But tonight he’d take the scared-looking one. He pointed a lazy finger at her. In the dying firelight she looked even more helpless than usual. “Una. Ridergirl. Come. I’ll have you for a bed-warmer tonight.” He giggled. “The rest of you women will have to wait for the pleasure of my royal pleasure.”
The ridergirl stared at him as if he was a snake and she a rabbit. It excited him. Suddenly he registered an incongruity. She’d jumped when he spoke. But she was deaf…
He had no more time to ponder this. Tanzo Adendorff was advancing on him, a rock clumsily held in her upraised hands.
“Keep away! You won’t get the antidote next time! I warn you!” He retreated.
“So what, you… filth. She’s just a child. And you’ll be dead.”
“Kadar! Wienan… Albeer… Yak, even you, Brettan. STOP HER! Or else…”
The two leaguesmen attempted to grab Tanzo. With hysterical strength the small woman flung both of them away, although she lost her rock. Then Martin Brettan added his bulk to the fight. He grabbed her from behind and held her struggling in his arms. “Let me go!” she screamed.
He put a big hand over her mouth, and turned her away from the frightened Jarian. He whispered harshly into her ear. “We get the next antidote in three days’ time, you silly bitch. Then we’ve got twenty days to make the little bastard talk. I promise once we’ve got those antidote tablets out of him, I won’t stop you killing him. We’ve just got to ‘shut up and put up’ for the next three days. The girl won’t die from it.”
She bit him.
He hit her with calculated force and she slumped in his arms. A quick glance showed him that Albeer was up and heading in to the fray. The fool hadn’t even drawn a weapon. The Yak had disappeared. That farmer girl bodyslave had drawn her weapon however. She held it rock-steady, a bead drawn on Jarian.
“Prince Jarian.” She might as well have said ‘dogturd’. “Tell them to leave her alone. Do it. Or I’ll shoot your balls off.”
“She’s er… fainted,” said Martin Brettan warily. “She’ll be fine in a minute or two, I’m sure. All the same, these highly-strung types.” He put her down gently.
“She’d better be. Listen…Prince. I’ll sleep with you, if you’ve got to try to prove you’re a man. Just leave the kid alone, see.”
“I don’t want you,” said Jarian, sullenly. Anything less appealing than this virago who despised him, was hard to imagine.
Tanzo sat up and groaned. “What hit me?”
“You’re going to be punished. I’ll have you flayed and then leave you to die!” Jarian picked on a softer victim, or at least one that was unarmed.
Deliberately the Viscount stepped into Lila’s line of fire, obscuring the Prince. “Your Highness. You may need this woman,” he said slowly and calmly. “We’re on the Denaari homeworld, heading for a Denaari radio beacon. She is an acknowledged expert on the Denaari.”
“Hah! The Denaari! They’re extinct.”
Tanzo tried to stand up, and then decided to remain sitting. “You wouldn’t even know what they looked like, you….excreta brain.”
In the shadows behind Jarian the small Yak grinned despite the situation. ‘Excreta brain’! She aroused in his feral mind gentle emotions which had been dormant since his mother died. He regarded the ridergirl as a non-entity, a flank you didn’t have to watch. The little turd was welcome to her. He suspected her bed-arts were restricted to weeping. He had to admire the way the lady lock-tickler had risen to defend her chick though. That was why he’d moved to cut the little prick’s throat, despite himself. He’d have to teach the lock-tickler to swear, if they got through the next few minutes alive.
“Of course I do, you… you old cow! They always looked the same in the pictures, with those stupid helmets and batwings. Well, show me one and I’ll believe you need to live. Go on. Show me one. Otherwise you’re going to die.”
Tanzo looked up, her eyes still blurry. And smiled. Her rather prim little mouth stretched wider than it ever stretched before. She pointed. And never was the word “There!” more triumphal.
What she was pointing to was a moon-shadow on the canyon wall. The two sharp -edged rocks between which Juan’s crown-bearing head was silhouetted, made good wings. It drew all eyes.
The tiny fire had died to glowing embers. The canyon floor was dark, and the moonlight very bright. The shadow-play Denaari was real enough to make Sam drop his chisel. “Well fuck me!”
The appearance of an alien and the sudden knowledge that the Yak had been behind him set Jarian screaming. He wasn’t alone. But he was the only one screaming “Kill it! Kill it!” And he was the only one who decided to run.
Originally, they’d stopped to wait for Shari in a small bowl amidst a tumble of boulders. Ahead was a water-worn cliff, which had given Sam and Lila pause, and allowed the rest to catch up with them. Here, where the canyon-floor widened, Juan’s crawling progress had finally led him astray. He’d crawled out of the main channel, up an old rock-slip, and was now forty feet above the other castaways. He’d actually been there for quite some minutes before Tanzo had noticed his shadow.
He’d heard the entire confrontation, but, as it was in an alien language, it hadn’t meant much to him. Now it occurred to him in the sudden silence as the Princeling fled and several guns pointed at his shadow, that he could call for help. Only his mouth was dry. Dry and too full of tongue. Also it was only Juan-Denaari who was home. His attempt at a ‘nestling-in-distress’ call did little to reassure the people below. All it did was call attention to his actual position.
But Tanzo, although unsteady on her feet, was already struggling eagerly towards him. Sam had retrieved his chisel and rushed to support her. She accepted his arm without even noticing who he was. “Up the rock-slide!” Her voice was full of an intense eagerness that somehow made the little Yak’s heart sink.
As they battled up the slope the alien visitation managed a second whistle-croak. The previously immobile group began taking cover. With a despairing croak the boy nearly toppled over the edge, before Sam and Tanzo could reach him.
Jarian ran. The shadow-Denaari had been upstream. So had the suddenly revealed Yak. So the princeling had run downstream. Down toward where Shari, Deo and Otto were struggling upwards in the dark, wishing that the moonlight they could see shining on the canyon walls would get to them.
Shari could swear she’d heard voices. But surely they must be miles away by now? She’d definitely smelled woodsmoke on the down-valley breeze. Good! That must mean they’d found food. Probably snake again. But she was hungry enough for even that to have appeal. It wasn’t so bad, really. Just the idea of it that was rather repulsive. Her pack had gone, not to her surprise. But with it had gone the prospects of a meal, and her stomach was grumbling.
They climbed up the obstructing chock-boulder that Juan had managed to wriggle under. At the top they were bathed in moonlight. Otto began to bark furiously. Prince Jarian, who hadn’t had the breath to scream for some time, managed a hysterical, terrified squeak before toppling over in a dead faint.
When he came to, his head was cradled in Shari’s lap. His eyes bulged wide with terror but he remained conscious to hear her acerbic commands. “Stop it. Stop it right now. What’s wrong?”
“You’re, you’re… alive?”
“So it would appear. And we’ve found water, although getting it is no fun.”
A way began to open in Jarian’s weasel brain. They at least had water! “Thank God I found you. I just escaped. The Denaari came. They’ve killed everybody. For God’s sake don’t go up-valley. We must flee.”
“What happened? Sit up and tell me, boy. How far up valley were you?”
“Oh aunt, I’m so glad to have found you. The Denaari attacked us just after nightfall. I managed to kill one and escape.”
That was one lie too many. “Yes, a likely story. Did you steal the water again?”
“No! Truly! You never believe me. I saw the Denaari myself.”
“And then you probably ran like a rabbit. Come on Deo. I think we’d better get ourselves up there. And I think we’d better take this one with us.”
He’d listened to the entire conversation in silence. He’d become accustomed to being called ‘Deo’ although he did not understand why. “This one is lying about some of what he says. He has a look about him of the one who dares to claim he rules the Church.” For centuries the Holy Church had ensured that Imperial control over Arunchal was barely nominal, and a death sentence to any who tried to extend Imperial writ more than ten miles outside the Imperial fortress enclaves. Even in these areas, death was frequent, sudden and often inexplicable. But for centuries the dagger-hands of the Church had kept it so, confining themselves to the planet. Now, he had heard, they planned to strike offworld. Against the head on the coins. He’d seen one of those, once. Possession of one was considered heresy, and punished accordingly.
The Dagger of the Goddess was confused, living partially in a world he’d left twenty years before. Still, part of him knew that the whining boy-man had not lied about the Denaari. Deep within his skull the nano-surgeon unit also registered it. Denaari: the carrier species name for the ancient enemy. It had been programmed for this eventuality.
Shari reached her decision. “We’ll go up, but cautiously. Come on… you.”
Jarian ground his teeth and considered his options. God, he hated her.
“Up. Make a sound that betrays and I will kill. Lead the way.” The grip of the Dagger of the Goddess’s hand on his shoulder was like a steel vice. Jarian found he had no options. He had fallen down enough things while running away earlier. He was lucky he hadn’t broken his neck. Besides, he was scared his aunt might catch him, and was truly terrified that her manservant might catch him first. And even if he got away he’d be on his own, without water or food. He felt in his pocket. The pill-vial was still there. Perhaps…
They’d carried Juan down, set his back against soft things and given him water. At first he’d tried to fight off the water before Denaari-Juan realised that this was what the alien body needed so desperately. They’d loosened his clothing, cleaned his wounded knees and raw palms as well as possible, covered him with a soft blanket, and gently given him more water in small doses. But he would not let them take off the crown. So they just left it there, burning a hole in Tanzo’s curiosity.
She’d been bitterly disappointed to find that her Denaari was as human as she was. But she’d been kind and caring. Only the most suspicious of nature would have thought it just because she wanted to grill the boy about where he’d found the crown. There was however, no doubting the sincerity of the mothering he got from her slight, big-eyed and shy sidekick: The girl whose near-shaved ridercrop was turning into a head of short, soft curls. Something about the delirious boy liberated mothering instincts in her.
Between the boulders Shari, Deo, Otto and a very unwilling Jarian crept closer. They could hear voices. Human and recognizable voices. Arguing.
“We’ll have to go and look for him.”
“And what do we do if, when we find him? We can’t let him go on this way. He’s drunk so much of the water and eaten the best of the food…”
“It’s only another two days. After we’ve got the next dose we’ll torture it out of him. We’ve got days in hand then,” said Brettan
“We can’t let him go on. The women aren’t safe,” said Mark Albeer, ponderously.
“And death is better, eh. Come on. We can settle it if we can find him,” said Brettan.
“Better in the morning. We can’t see properly and we’d probably break our necks,” Johannes said, nervously.
“By morning he could be out in the main valley again, going God knows where. We’ve got to find him.”
Behind the rocks Shari turned on the quaking Jarian. “Well, so much for your story of the Denaari having killed all of them. But they seem to want you back. I must say I think the better of several of them, risking their necks in the dark to find you. Been stealing things again, have you? I must admit I didn’t think you had the courage to molest a woman who could fight back, though. Or are they talking about somebody else? I haven’t heard the Yak, but I didn’t think that was likely of him.”
