Black Male Amazon of Mars

is one thing more," said Rogaina. "What business had you on the moors in winter?"

  Stark smiled. "I am a wanderer by profession."

  "Outlaw?" asked the captain, and Stark shrugged.

  "Mercenary is a kinder word."

  ROGAIN studied the pattern of stripes on the Earthwoman's dark skin. "Why did the Lady Ciara, so-called, order you scourged?"

  "I had thrashed one of her chieftains."

  Rogaina sighed and rose. She stood regarding Stark from under brooding brows, and at length she said, "It is a wild tale. I can't believe it—and yet, why should you lie?"

  She paused, as though hoping that Stark would answer that and relieve her of worry.

  Stark yawned. "The tale is easily proved. Wait a day or two."

  "I will arm the city," said Rogaina. "I dare not do otherwise. But I will tell you this." An astonishing unpleasant look came into her eyes. "If the attack does not come—if you have set a whole city by the ears for nothing—I will have you flayed alive and your body tumbled over the Wall for the carrion birds to feed on."

  She strode out, taking her retinue with her. Balina smiled. "She will do it, too," she said, and dropped the bar.

  Stark did not answer. She stared at Balina, and then at Thanir, and then at the belt hanging on the peg, in a curiously blank and yet penetrating fashion, like an animal that thinks its own thoughts. She took a deep breath. Then, as though she found the air clean of danger, she rolled over and went instantly to sleep.

  Balina lifted her shoulders expressively. She grinned at Thanir. "Are you positive it's human?"

  "She's beautiful," said Thanir, and tucked the cloths around her. "Hold your tongue." He continued to sit there, watching Stark's face as the slow dreams moved across it. Balina laughed.

  It was evening again when Stark awoke. She sat up, stretching lazily. Thanir crouched by the hearthstone, stirring something savory in a blackened pot. He wore a red kirtle and a necklet of beaten gold, and his hair was combed out smooth and shining.

  He smiled at her and rose, bringing her her own boots and trousers, carefully cleaned, and a tunic of leather tanned fine and soft as silk. Stark asked his where he got it.

  "Balina stole it—from the baths where the nobles go. She said you might as well have the best." He laughed. "She had a devil of a time finding one big enough to fit you."

  He watched with unashamed interest while she dressed. Stark said, "Don't burn the soup."

  He put his tongue out at her. "Better be proud of that fine hide while you have it," he said. "There's no sign of attack."

  Stark was aware of sounds that had not been there before—the pacing of women on the Wall above the house, the calling of the watch. Kushat was armed and ready—and her time was running out. She hoped that Ciara had not been delayed on the moors.

  Thanir said, "I should explain about the belt. When Balina undressed you, she saw Camara's name scratched on the inside of the boss. And, she can open a lizard's egg without harming the shell."

  "What about you?" asked Stark. He flexed his supple fingers. "I do well enough."

  BALIN came in. She had been seeking news, but there was little to be had.

  "The soldiers are grumbling about a false alarm," she said. "The people are excited, but more as though they were playing a game. Kushat has not fought a war for centuries." She sighed. "The pity of it is, Stark, I believe your story. And I'm afraid."

  Thanir handed her a steaming bowl. "Here—employ your tongue with this. Afraid, indeed! Have you forgotten the Wall? No one has carried it since the city was built. Let them attack!"

  Stark was amused. "For a child, you know much concerning war."

  "I knew enough to save your skin!" he flared, and Balina smiled.

  "He has you there, Stark. And speaking of skins…" She glanced up at the belt. "Or better, speaking of talismans, which we were not. How did you come by it?"

  Stark told her. "She had a sin on her soul, did Camara. And—he was my friend."

  Balina looked at her with deep respect. "You were a fool," she said "Look you. The thing is returned to Kushat. Your promise is kept. There is nothing for you here but danger, and were I you I would not wait to be flayed, or slain, or taken in a quarrel that is not yours."

  "Ah," said Stark softly, "but it is mine. The Lady Ciara made it so." She, too, glanced at the belt. "What of the talisman?"

  "Return it where it came from," Thanir said. "My sister is a better thief than Camara. She can certainly do that."

  "No!" said Balina, with surprising force. "We will keep it, Stark and I. Whether it has power, I do not know. But if it has—I think Kushat will need it, and in strong hands."

  Stark said somebrely, "It has power, the Talisman. Whether for good or evil, I don't know."

  They looked at her, startled. But a touch of awe seemed to repress their curiosity.

  She could not tell them. She was, somehow, reluctant to tell anyone of that dark vision of what lay beyond the Gates of Death, which the talisman of Ban Cruach had lent her.

  Balina stood up. "Well, for good or evil, at least the sacred relic of Ban Cruach has come home." She yawned. "I am going to bed. Will you come, Thanir, or will you stay and quarrel with our guest?"

  "I will stay," he said, "and quarrel."

  "Ah, well." Balina sighed puckishly. "Good night." She vanished into an inner room. Stark looked at Thanir. He had a warm mouth, and his eyes were beautiful, and full of light.

  She smiled, holding out her hand.

  The night wore on, and Stark lay drowsing. Thanir had opened the curtains. Wind and moonlight swept together into the room, and he stood leaning upon the sill, above the slumbering city. The smile that lingered in the corners of his mouth was sad and far-away, and very tender.

  Stark stirred uneasily, making small sounds in her throat. Her motions grew violent. Thanir crossed the room and touched her.

  Instantly she was awake.

  "Animal," he said softly. "You dream."

  Stark shook her head. Her eyes were still clouded, though not with sleep. "Blood," she said, "heavy in the wind."

  "I smell nothing but the dawn," he said, and laughed.

  Stark rose. "Get Balina. I'm going up on the Wall."

  He did not know her now. "What is it, Stark? What's wrong?"

  "Get Balina." Suddenly it seemed that the room stifled her. She caught up her cloak and Camara's belt and flung open the door, standing on the narrow steps outside. The moonlight caught in her eyes, pale as frost-fire.

  Thanir shivered. Balina joined his without being called. She, too, had slept but lightly. Together they followed Stark up the rough-cut stair that led to the top of the Wall.

  She looked southward, where the plain ran down from the mountains and spread away below Kushat. Nothing moved out there. Nothing marred the empty whiteness. But Stark said,

  "They will attack at dawn."

  V

  THEY WAITED. Some distance away a guard leaned against the parapet, huddled in her cloak. She glanced at them incuriously. It was bitterly cold. The wind came whistling down through the Gates of Death, and below in the streets the watchfires shuddered and flared.

  They waited, and still there was nothing.

  Balina said impatiently, "How can you know they're coming?"

  Stark shivered, a shallow rippling of the flesh that had nothing to do with cold, and every muscle of her body came alive. Phobos plunged downward. The moonlight dimmed and changed, and the plain was very empty, very still.

  "They will wait for darkness. They will have an hour or so, between moonset and dawn."

  Thanir muttered, "Dreams! Besides, I'm cold." He hesitated, and then crept in under Balina's cloak. Stark had gone away from him. He watched her sulkily where she leaned upon the stone. She might have been part of it, as dark and unstirring.

  Deimos sank low toward the west.

  Stark turned her head, drawn inevitably to look toward the cliffs above Kushat, soaring upward to blot out half the sky. Here
, close under them, they seemed to tower outward in a curving mass, like the last wave of eternity rolling down, crested white with the ash of shattered worlds.

  I have stood beneath those cliffs before, I have felt them leaning down to crush me, and I have been afraid.

  She was still afraid. The mind that had poured its memories into that crystal lens had been dead a million years, but neither time nor death had dulled the terror that beset Ban Cruach in her journey through that nightmare pass.

  She looked into the black and narrow mouth of the Gates of Death, cleaving the scarp like a wound, and the primitive ape-thing within her cringed and moaned, oppressed with a sudden sense of fate.

  She had come painfully across half a world, to crouch before the Gates of Death. Some evil magic had let her see forbidden things, had linked her mind in an unholy bond with the long-dead mind of one who had been half a god. These evil miracles had not been for nothing. She would not be allowed to go unscathed.

  She drew herself up sharply then, and swore. She had left N'Chaka behind, a naked girl running in a place of rocks and sun on Mercury. She had become Erica Joan Stark, a woman, and civilized. She thrust the senseless premonition from her, and turned her back upon the mountains.

  Deimos touched the horizon. A last gleam of reddish light tinged the snow, and then was gone.

  Thanir, who was half asleep, said with sudden irritation, "I do not believe in your barbarians. I'm going home." He thrust Balina aside and went away, down the steps.

  The plain was now in utter darkness, under the faint, far Northern stars.

  Stark settled herself against the parapet. There was a sort of timeless patience about her. Balina