CHAPTER V
Light lowered in the sky as they walked beside the river, keeping closeto the rocky edge and brushing away vines that strung into the waterfrom hanging limbs. Urson broke down a branch as thick as his wrist andas tall as himself and smote the water with it, playfully. "That shouldput a welt on anyone's head who wants to bother us." He raised thestick from the water and drops ran along the bark, moving sparks at theends of dark lines.
"We'll have to turn into the woods for food soon," said Iimmi, "unlesswe wait for animals who come down to drink."
Urson tugged at another branch, and it twisted loose from fibrous whitepulp. "Here," he handed it to Iimmi. "I'll have one for you in a moment,Geo."
"And maybe we could explore a little, before it gets dark," Geosuggested.
Urson handed him the third staff. "There's not much here I want to see,"he muttered.
"Well, we can't sleep on the bank. We've got to find a place hidden inthe trees."
"Can you see what that is through there?" Iimmi asked.
"Where?" asked Geo. "Huh...?" Through the thick growth was a risingshadow. "A rock or a cliff?" he suggested.
"Maybe," mused Urson, "but it's awfully regular."
Geo started off into the underbrush, and the others followed. Their goalwas further and larger than it had looked from the river. Once theypassed across a section of ten or twelve stones, rectangular and side byside, like paving. Small trees had pushed up between some of them, butfor thirty feet, before the edge sank beneath the soft jungle floor itwas easier going. Suddenly the growth became thin again and they were atthe edge of a relatively clear area. Before them loomed the ruins of agreat building. Six girders cleared the highest wall, implying anoriginal height of eighteen or twenty stories. One wall was completelysheared away and fragments of it chunked the ground. The revealed darkcaves of broken rooms and cubicles suggested an injured granite hive.They approached slowly.
To one side a great metal cylinder lay askew a heap of rubbish. A flatblade of metal transversed it, one side twisting into the ground whereskeletal girders shown beneath ripped plating. A row of windows likedark eyes lined the body, and a door gaped in an idiotic oval halfwayalong its length.
Fascinated, they turned toward the injured wreck. As they neared, asound came from inside the door. They stopped, and their staves leapt aprotective inch from the ground. In the shadow of the door, ten feetfrom the ground, another shadow moved, resolving itself into an animalhead, long, muzzled, gray. Then they could see the forelegs. It lookedlike an immense dog, and it was carrying a smaller animal, obviouslydead, in its mouth. It saw them, watched them, was still.
"Dinner," Urson said softly. "Come on." They moved forward again. Thenthey stopped.
Suddenly the beast sprang from the doorway. Shadow and distance had madethem completely underestimate its size. Along the sprung arc flowed acanine body nearly five feet long. Urson struck up at it and knocked itfrom its flight with his stick. As it fell, Iimmi and Geo were upon itwith theirs, clubbing its chest and head. For six blows it staggered andcould not gain its feet. Then, as it threatened to heave to standing,Urson rushed forward and brought his stave straight down on the chest:bones snapped and tore through the brown pelt, only to have their bluesheen covered a moment later by a well of blood. It howled, kicked itshind feet at the stake with which Urson held it to the ground, and thenstretched out its limbs and quivered. The front legs stretched, andstretched, while the torso seemed to pull in on itself, shrinking in thedeath agonies. The long mouth, which had dropped its prey, gaped open asthe head flopped from side to side, the pink tongue lolling, shrinking.
"My God," said Geo.
The sharp muzzle blunted now and the claws in the padded paw stretched,opened into human fingers and a thumb. The hairlessness of theunder-belly had spread to the entire carcass. Hind legs lengthened,joints reversed themselves, and bare knees bent as human feet draggedthemselves through fragments of brown leaves over the ground and a humanthigh gave a final contraction, stilled, and then one leg fell outstraight again. A shaggy, black-haired man lay still on the ground, hischest caved and bloody. In one last throw, he flung his hands up tograsp the stake and pull it from his chest, but too weak, they slippeddown as his lips curled back from his mouth revealing a row ofperfectly white, blunt teeth.
Urson stepped back, and then back again. The stave fell, pulled loosewith a sucking explosion from the ruined mess of lung. The bear man hadraised his hand to his own chest and seized his triple, gold token. "Inthe name of the Goddess," he finally said.
Iimmi walked forward now, picked up the carcass of the smaller animalthat had been dropped, and turned away. "Well," he said, "I guess dinnerisn't going to be as big as we thought."
"I guess not," Geo said.
They walked back to the ruined building, away from the corpse.
"Hey, Urson," Geo said at last to the big man who was still holding hiscoins, "Snap out of it. What's the matter?"
"The only man I've ever seen whose body was that broken in that way," hesaid slowly, "was one whose side struck into by a ship's spar."
* * * * *
They decided to settle that evening at the corner of one of thebuilding's ruined walls. They produced fire with a rock against asection of slightly rusted girder. And after much sawing on a jaggedmetal blade protruding from a pile of rubble, they managed to quarterthe animal and rip most of the pelt from its red body. With thinbranches to hold the meat, they did a passable job of roasting. Althoughpartially burned, partially raw, and without seasoning, they ate it, andtheir hunger ceased. As they sat huddled by the wall, ripping red juicyfibers from the last bones with their teeth, night swelled through thejungle, imprisoning them in the shell of orange flicking from theirfire.
"Shall we leave it going?" asked Urson.
"Fire keeps animals away," Iimmi said.
On leaves piled together now they stretched out by the wall of thebroken building. There was quiet--an insect hum, no un-namablechitterings, except for the comforting rush of the river's water.
Geo was first to awake, his eyes filled with silver. The entire clearinghad been flooded by white light from the huge disk of the moon that saton the rim of the trees. Iimmi and Urson beside him looked uncomfortablycorpse-like, and he was about to reach over and touch Iimmi'soutstretched arm when there was a noise behind him, like beaten cloth.He jerked his head around, and was staring at the gray wall by whichthey had camped. He looked up at the spreading plane that tore offraggedly against the night. Fatigue had washed into something unpleasantand hard in his belly that had little to do with tiredness. He stretchedhis arm in the leaves once more and put his cheek down on the cool fleshof his shoulder.
The beating sound came again and continued for a few seconds. He rolledhis face up and stared at the sky. Something crossed on the moon. Itseemed to expand a moment, spread its wings, and draw them in again.
He reached out, his arm over the leaves like thunder, and grabbedIimmi's black shoulder. Iimmi grunted, started, then rolled over on hisback, and opened his eyes. Geo saw the black chest drop with expelledbreath, the only recognition given. A few seconds later the chest roseagain. Iimmi turned his face to Geo and raised his finger to his lips.Then he turned his face back up to the night. Three more times theflapping sounded behind them, behind the wall, Geo realized. Once heglanced down again and saw that Iimmi had raised his arm and put it overhis eyes.
They passed years that way. Then a flock suddenly leapt from the wall.Some of them fell twenty feet before their wings filled with air andthey rose again. They circled wider and before they returned, anotherflock dropped off into the night.
As they fell this time, Geo suddenly grabbed Iimmi's arm and pulled itdown from his eyes. The figures dropped through the dark like kites,sixty feet above them, forty feet, thirty; then there was a thin,piercing shriek. Iimmi was up on his feet in a second, and Geo besidehim, their staffs in hand.
"Here it comes," breathed Iimmi
. He kicked at Urson, but the big manwas already on his knees, and then feet. The wings beat insistently anddarkly before them as they stood against the wall. The figures flewtoward them and at the terrifying distance of five feet, reversed. "Idon't think they can get in at the wall," said Iimmi.
"I hope the hell they can't," Urson said.
The figures dropped to the ground, black wings crumpling to their bodiesin the moonlight. In the growing hoard of shadow in front of them, lightsnagged on a metal blade.
Then two of the creatures detached from the others and hurled themselvesforward, swords arcing suddenly above their heads.
They swung their staffs as hard as they could, catching both beasts onthe chest. They fell backwards in a sudden expansion of rubbery wings,as though they had stumbled into billowing dark canvas.
Three more now leapt over the fallen ones, shrieking. As they came,Urson looked up and jammed his staff into the belly of a fourth monsterwho was about to fall on them from above. One got past Iimmi's whistlingstaff and Geo had to stop swinging and grab a furry arm. He pulled it tothe side, overbalancing the huge, sailed creature. It dropped its swordas it lay for a moment, struggling on its back. Geo grabbed the bladeand brought it straight from the ground up into the gut of another ofthe creatures who spread open its wings and staggered back. He wrestedthe blade free, and then turned it down into the body of the fallen one;it made a thick sound like a crushed sponge. As the blade came out againand he hacked into a shadow on his left, a voice suddenly sounded, butinside his head.
_The ... jewels ..._
"Snake!" bawled Geo. "Where the hell are you?" He was still holding hisstaff, and now he flung it forward, spear-like, into the face of anadvancing beast. Struck, it opened up like a black parachute, knockingaway three of its companions, before it fell.
In the view, cleared for an instant, Geo saw a slight, spidery form,dart from the jungle edge into the clearing. With his free hand Georipped the jewels from his neck and flung the confused handful of thongand chain over the heads of the shrieking beasts. The beads made adouble eye in the light at the top of their arc before they fell on theleaves beyond. Snake picked them up and held them above his head.
Fire leapt from the boy's hands in a double bolt that converged in thecenter of the dark bodies. A red flair silhouetted the jagged edge of awing. A wing flamed, waved flame, and the burning beast tried to takeair before it fell, splashing fire about it. Orange light caught sharpon brown faces chiseled with shadow, caught in the terrified red bead ofan eye or along double fangs behind dark lips.
Burning wings withered on the ground; dead leaves had sparked now, andwhips of light ran on the clearing floor. The beasts retreated and thethree men stood against the wall, panting.
"Watch out!" Iimmi suddenly called.
Snake looked up as the great wings tented over him, hiding himmomentarily. Red flared beneath them, and suddenly the beasts fell away,their sails sweeping over the dead leaves, moved by wind or life, Geocouldn't tell. Dark flappings rose on the moon, grew further away, andwere gone.
Away from the wall, they saw the fire had blown up against the wall andwas dying. They ran quickly toward the edge of the forest. "Snake," saidGeo when they stopped. "This is Iimmi, this is Snake. We told you abouthim."
Iimmi extended his hand. "Glad to meet you."
"Look," said Geo, "he can read your mind, so if you still think he's aspy ..."
Iimmi grinned. "Remember the general rule? If he is a spy, it's going toget much too complicated trying to figure why he saved us like that."
Urson scratched his head. "If it's a choice between Snake and nothing,we better take Snake. Hey, Four Arms, I owe you a thrashing." He paused,then laughed. "I hope some day I get a chance to give it to you."
"Where have you been, anyway?" Geo asked. He put his hand on the boy'sshoulder. "You're wet."
"Our water friends again?" suggested Urson.
"Probably," said Geo.
Snake now held one hand toward Geo.
"What's that? Oh, you don't want to keep them?"
Snake shook his head.
"All right," said Geo. He took one jewel and put it around his neck.
Geo took the wrought chain with the platinum claw from his neck and hungit around Iimmi's. The white eye shown on his dark chest in themoonlight. Now Snake beckoned them to follow him back across theclearing. They came, stopping to pick up swords from the shriveleddarknesses on the ground about the clearing. As they passed around theedge of the broken building, Geo looked for the corpse they had leftthere, but it was gone.
"Where are we going?" asked Urson.
Snake only motioned them onward. They neared the broken cylinder andSnake scrambled up the rubble under the dark hole through which theman-wolf had leaped earlier that evening.
At the door, Snake turned and lifted the jewel from Geo's neck, and heldit aloft. The jewel glowed now, with a blue-green light that seeped intothe corners and crevices of the ruined entrance. Shreds of cloth hung atthe windows, most of which were broken. Twigs and rubbish littered themetal floor. They walked between double seats toward a door at the farend. Effaced signs still hung on the walls.
N .. SM .. K .. G
The door at the end was ajar, and Snake opened it all the way. Somethingscuttered through a cracked window. The jewel's light showed two seatsbroken from their fixtures. Vines covered the front window in which onlya few splinters of glass hung on the rim. Draped in rotten fabric, a fewmetal rings about wrists and ankles, two skeletons with silver helmetshad fallen from the seats. Snake pointed to a row of smashed glass disksin front of the broken seats.
_Radio_ ... they heard in their minds.
Now he reached down into the mess on the floor and dislodged a chunk ofrusted metal. _Gun_, he said, showing it to Geo.
The three men examined it. "What's it good for?" asked Urson.
Snake shrugged.
"Are there any electricities, or diodes around?" asked Geo, rememberingthe words from before.
Snake shrugged again.
"Why did you want to show us all this?" Geo asked.
The boy only turned and started back toward the door. When they werestanding in the oval entrance, about to climb down, Iimmi pointed to theruins of the building ahead of them. "Do you know what that building wascalled?"
_Barracks_, Snake said.
"I know that word," said Geo.
"So do I," said Iimmi. "It means a place where they used to keepsoldiers all together. It's from one of the old languages."
"Where to now?" Urson asked Snake.
The boy climbed back down into the clearing and they followed him intothe denser wood where only pearls of light scattered through the trees.They emerged at a broad ribbon of silver, the river, broken by rocks.
"We were right the first time," Geo said. "We should have stayed here."
The sound of rippling, sloshing, the full whisper of leaves and foliagealong the edges of the forest--these accompanied them as they lay downon the dried moss behind the larger rocks. And with the heaviness ofrelease on them, they dropped, like stones down a well, the bright poolof sleep.
* * * * *
_The bright pool of silver grew and spread and wrinkled into thefamiliar shapes of mast, the rail of the deck, and the whiteness of thesea beyond the ship. The scene moved down the deck, until another gauntfigure approached from the other direction. The features, thoughstrangely distorted by whiteness and pulled to grotesquerie, wererecognizable as those of the captain as he drew near._
_"Oh, mate," said the captain._
_Silence, while the mate gave an answer they couldn't hear._
_"Yes," answered the captain. "I wonder what she wants, too." His voicewas hollow, etiolated like a flower grown in darkness. The captainturned and knocked on Argo's cabin door. It opened, and they steppedin._
_The hand that opened the door for them was thin as winter twigs. Thewalls of the room seemed draped in spider webs and hangingsinsubst
antial as layered dust. The great desk seemed spindly, grotesque,and the papers on top of it were tissue thin, threatening to scutter andcrumble with a breath. The chandelier above gave more languishing whitesmoke than light, and the arms, branches, and complexed array of oilcups looked like a convocation of spiders._
_Argo spoke in a pale white voice that sounded like the whisper of thinfingers tearing webs._
_"So," she said. "We will stay at least another seven days."_
_"But why?" asked the captain._
_"I have received a sign from the sea."_
_"I do not wish to question your authority, Priestess," began thecaptain._
_"Then do not," interrupted Argo._
_"My mate has raised the objection that ..."_
_"Your mate has raised his hand to me once," stated the Priestess. "Itis only in my benevolence ..." Here she paused, and her voice becamemore unsure, "... that I do not destroy him where he stands." Beneath,her veil, a face could be made out that might have belonged to a driedskull._
_"But," began the captain._
_"We wait here by the island of Aptor another seven days," commandedArgo. She looked away from the captain now, in a direction that musthave been straight into the eyes of the mate. From behind the veil, hatewelled like living liquid from the seemingly empty sockets. They turnedto go, and once more on deck, they stopped to watch the sea. Near theindistinct horizon, a sharp tongue of land outlined itself withmountains. The cliffs were chalky on one side, then streaked with redand blue clays on the other. There was a reddish glow beyond onemountain, like the shimmering of a volcano. And dark as most of it was,it was a distinct darkness, backed with purple, or broken by the warm,differing grays of individual rocks. Even through the night, at thisdistance, beyond the silver crescent of the beach, the jungle lookedrich, green even in the darkness, redolently full and quiveringly heavywith life._
* * * * *
And then the thin screams ...