Ice and Shadow (44 page)

Zurzal was ready with the translator. “Greeting, Worshipful One, you have been awaited—the hour grows late.” There was a kind of snap in the Zacathan’s voice; whether such a nuance was translated into the squealing by the disc Jofre could not guess. But he was very sure that Zurzal was prepared to take a firm stand with this visitor.

Those wide lips puffed forth a breath which was foul. And then squeaked in answer:

“The Axe of Rou comes or goes not at the will of off-worlders. There is little patience—what would you do here, stranger?”

“I seek, as I have said, knowledge. Your world is old—it has seen many changes—is that not so?”

“Rou works as it is willed. The earth and all which forms it is for
HIM
as the mud of the under leaf is to the maker of pots, as the knuckle of iron to him who fashions a blade. But what do you know of these changes you speak of? You are not one with Rou.”

“Rou exists in many forms also,” Zurzal answered. “Can it not be that it is by
His
will we stand here this night? Axe of Rou, would it not be to such a close-held follower as you that revelations would be made? Or is it that the Axe merely speaks for another who is closer to the ear of Rou?”

“I have the ear of Rou.” The squealing arose to a high pitch. “Say it to me, off-worlder, and I shall judge whether this be business of Rou’s Own or not.”

“Very well.” The Zacathan stooped and laid a hand lightly on the scanner case. “This I carry, Axe of Rou, is born of long study and the use of very ancient records. It has the power to bring to light matters lost in the long seasons forgotten by men whose memories cannot hold so much. There is a place in the Shattered Land which bears a certain mark. That was discovered by some knowledge seekers before me. But they did not possess such an aid as this one and they were driven away before they could obtain much which they were sure could be learned. Therefore I have come to carry on this work and see into the ages behind—”

“Only Rou can look behind more than one lifetime!”

“So can I not, without this. But it is the learning which Rou allows men that has brought this into being and the glory will be
HIS
when the great find is made.”

The priest wiped the palm of his light-free hand across his triple chin. He was like all of his kind, Jofre believed, seeking what could lie in such a matter which would further his own gain.

“What would you need to do Rou’s Will in this matter?” The demand was abrupt. Their needs would also present a bargaining point.

“We need a guide to the Shattered Land, and transportation for ourselves and our gear.” Zurzal was as quick to deliver his needs.

“The Shattered Land—it is a place of the Long Dead, of the damned Ones who followed Vunt. You will find no true follower of Rou to enter there. But—” The squeaking voice paused for a moment. Jofre tensed, sensing that what was coming now was of the first importance as far as the priest was concerned.

“There once was land where Rou had
His
place. And—yes, there are very old stories that there was powerful knowledge to be found there—left behind when the Will of Rou twisted that part of the world with fire and the shaking of the earth. But why should we allow such knowledge to fall into the hands of off-worlders? By what right do you claim the knowledge which was once that of Rou’s children?”

“None,” the Zacathan returned promptly. “I freely surrender all claims to what may be found if those of Rou will it so.”

“Then,” came back the priest with a rush, “what do you gain, off-worlder, if you surrender any knowledge treasure which may be found? Why do you, and these with you, willingly go into the Dead Land if you gain no benefit from your labors?”

“I will make with this,” again the Zacathan indicated the scanner, “a record, one which you will be free to see. It is my wish to prove that I can set aside the mists of the past. With such proof I can visit other worlds and on each I can add to the store of ancient knowledge. To my people, Axe, such is the primary work of our lives. We find in any discoveries value, whether it is something which can be seen and handled, or whether it abides only in the minds thereafter.”

“There must be a considering of this,” the Axe replied. “You will be told what the answer will be.” So abruptly he turned and waddled away.

“He has a reason,” Jofre ventured. The issha might not be able to read minds but they were aware when alerted to certain emanations of emotion. He was certain that the Axe was indeed taking time out to think and that, behind his assent, if assent it would be, there would also be a scheme set in motion.

“There is one on guard,” Taynad said in a low tone from the door to which they had followed, more slowly, their late visitor.

“We could not expect less,” Zurzal asserted. “But I think we need fear no more attention until our friend is ready to move.”

CHAPTER 26

IT WAS ONLY PARTLY IMPATIENCE
which rode Jofre. He held Zurzal’s knowledge to be far above even that of the Shagga priests—and put to better use. However, he also knew that the Zacathan was so fiercely determined to prove the efficiency of the scanner that he might be led to overlook any hidden threats. Its use on Tssek had confirmed for Zurzal that he could do this, but to be able to deliver a find from Lochan would reestablish his credit among his own peers. And that was a situation which Jofre could understand very well, even though he himself could have no hope of a triumphant return to Asborgan and an addition of issha status made by the Shagga.

The sheer mechanics of a crossing of the long tundralike plain to the northern country was always to the fore of his mind. That they could tramp it carrying all their supplies was out of the question. From the scanty tape information they had studied so carefully they knew that the Shattered Land would be a far greater obstacle even than the insect-infested tundra.

“We can make no deal with Gosal?” he asked, though he was sure of the answer. “Even if he would give us use of the one gravity sled—”

“Those carriers,” Taynad added as if she had been following some line of reasoning of her own, “are they natives or beasts, servants, slaves—? The Jat has tried to reach them by mind touch—there is nothing there.”

“They serve both the maned people and those they call Deves,” Jofre commented. “But even with such aid could we reach our goal while our supplies still hold out?”

Zurzal’s toothed jaws showed in a grin. “We shall have another visitor,” he stated. “One who will come by dark.”

And Jofre, who had quickly retaken his place as sentry, was startled as there was a warning from the other end of the warehouse, that where there seemed to be only solid wall. He saw movement and knew that Taynad was on alert, slipping from their cubicle to the door of the next, the Jat close beside her.

“It is all right,” Zurzal said, his hissing voice carrying easily. “Bright evening to you, Commander!”

That port official who had been so obstructive at their landing passed close enough to one of the moss torches to show his face, pausing in the light a second or two as if to make sure they recognized him, before he slipped into their quarters and settled himself cross-legged facing the Zacathan.

“You are a fool, Learned One,” his voice had the rasp of exasperation in it. “There is no way under the Heavens of Lochan that you can succeed in this.”

“Men have succeeded on thinner chances than the one I have been offered, Wok Bi. And you have your orders.”

“Orders!” The man flung up his hands in a gesture which suggested that this was indeed folly. “You head willfully into country where one expedition came to a very bloody end. There are what—four of you—one a woman—another a Jat—you would need a squad of Patrol to even venture over the border there. It is madness and you are forcing me to be a part of it.”

“Your orders are plain,” Zurzal returned placidly. “Yes, we are a small party, but that means we have less to transport. It is the transport that we must now consider.”

“No Pungal owner will lease out to you and I cannot make them.” There was a small note of satisfaction in that. “And on your own feet there is no possible way to reach your goal before Change-season.”

“There are the Gar,” Zurzal said.

“Gar!” The way Wok Bi said that name made it sound as if the Zacathan had hissed it.

Gar—Jofre remembered. There had been a brief note concerning them on one of the tapes. They were the nomads of the inner lands and the off-worlders would have to transverse those in order to reach their own goal.

“Yes. Captain Gosal has a mixed cargo. There were Gar dealers to meet us at set down. And those have caravan trails inland. With fresh goods some one of them will be moving out.”

“The priests will not hear of it!” Wok Bi fell back on a second objection.

“I think that there will be a change of thought there, too. Now—the Gar caravans must have been transport other than these Pungal—”

Wok Bi shook his head. “No, not this side of the Var, but they do have carriers which are steady movers. It is said that sometimes they keep the trail for a full day and a night at a time since their drivers have learned to sleep a-swing. On the other side of the Var—there you would have to take your chance with what the Wild Ones use—they have mounts of a sort—I have seen a couple of specimens of them—running four-legged, with a sweep of horn—and nasty tempered I am told. Also that you might be able to make any deals for a guide or beasts of burden beyond the Var—that is very problematical.”

“Commander, you have done your duty in stating frankly all the perils we must face. I shall, of course, give you a tape absolving you of blame which might come from some catastrophe. But go on, we shall.”

Again the man threw up his hands. “On your head be it. There is also this—within the Shattered Land none of our coms work. If you are caught in some trouble, you cannot call for any aid—not that we would have any to send you.”

“That is also understood,” agreed the Zacathan.

“Be it on your own heads then.” The commander got up. “I do not expect to see you again. If there is any hope of fortune, may it be yours. But I doubt such exists.”

They settled then for the night, Jofre taking the first watch once again, well advised that the warehouse door was under surveillance from the outside. He thought of Zurzal’s stubbornness. To an oathed the wishes of his patron were law. He might advise if called upon, but the central core of any operation remained the choice of the one to whom he had pledged himself. After all, men of the Lair had served very threatened causes before, and the triumph of some of them over great odds was the material for the Legend singers. No man could see the future and it was best to live but one day, one night at a time. His fingers sought within his girdle for that small pocket he had fashioned and drew out the stone. There was no heart fire in it, but it was warm and that warmth reached within him, far—banishing the ghosts of foreseeing. He held it so until Taynad moved up to take his place as sentry, closing his hand quickly when he heard those faint stirs in the dark which marked her coming. This was his secret only and he would hold it so.

However, Taynad had thoughts of her own. She had taken the measure of this Zacathan and she believed that if anyone could succeed in what sounded like a fever-born dream quest, it was he. There was something else. She found the twigs of her braids and once more fingering read their message. If not capture—kill! But to take the life of a Brother was to break-oath. And not to follow orders was an even greater break-oath. The Shagga wanted Jofre—they would find the means of contacting her even here—since they had joined forces with the Guild. The latter was as legendary as the issha-trained in achieving what its members were set to do.

Why did they want him? And why, if they could not take him bodily, did they demand blood? By his own tale, which instinct told her was the full truth, he had done nothing to provoke all custom and honor. She must watch, wait, and see what time itself would bring in answer. Kill—her fingernail bit into that last ominous notch. Though perhaps—with Shagga wrath so raised against him, he might welcome death rather than to fall into the hands of the priests.

Priests—it would seem that there were always priests to deal with. Her mouth twisted disdainfully as she thought of the Axe of Rou. But he, she believed, from what she had sensed of him was a relatively simple man—wily in a way, of course, but no match even for the Zacathan. He might well be brought to support them up to a point and right now they could use support.

She stretched. By the Flowers of Moon Valley, how she longed for a dip in one of the Three Pools with the comfort of an oil rub thereafter. Before this journeying was done with the Jewelbright might well be the Jeweldimmed and worth no second look from any man.

The Axe of Rou duly returned, at the first dim light of day, somewhat to the surprise of Jofre and Taynad though it would seem that Zurzal had been expecting him.

“You have taken council?” he greeted the priest.

“What do you offer?” countered the Axe.

“Let one of your own, one whom you trust, go with us—let him bring guards also if you will. What we find—the solid portion will be yours—we shall keep only the record of its finding.”

“The trader U-Ky leaves today,” the priest said. “It is true I shall be with him as it is necessary that I return to the Walls. And my Deves will bear me company. If you can bargain for transport with U-Ky—then let it be done.”

It seemed that the Zacathan had very little trouble striking the bargain with the red-maned trader whom Jofre continued to watch narrowly. The fellow was a double for that alien who had been on Wayright though there was no way he could have made the journey back without their knowing it. It must be that there was such a strong resemblance between members of his race that it was difficult for outsiders to differentiate between them. What Zurzal offered him was a packet of silver pieces, such an exchange allowed by Wok Bi, in whose presence the transaction was done—silver being, it appeared, in rare supply on Lochan.

Their bargaining obtained the use of four of the swing carrying monsters. Zurzal, with the scanner across his knees, occupied the left swing of the first, Jofre the right. Behind them came Taynad with the Jat, balanced by a selection of equal weight of their gear, and the final bearers transported the rest of their equipment.

The heat as they set out was intense but at least, perched on swings, they were above the insect swarms. Though the constant movement of those seats made the off-world riders a little giddy and queasy, inclined to hold on tightly wherever a good anchorage offered.

U-Ky’s caravan was a fairly impressive command and he rode to its head. There was also the bearer who balanced the great weight of the Axe against a tall pile of bundles. Swinging along behind the priest were the robed Deves. Strung out behind came some of the maned people, only a few of them red-maned and the rest as yellow-backed as the tundra.

Their rate of progress was no faster than a ponderous walk; apparently the huge bearers kept to what was a steady pace for them and never displayed any change in gait. Under the climbing and burning sun this travel was misery for the off-worlders and Jofre had to fight to hold on to his patience.

The yellow tundra seemed to stretch forever and though the caravan headed confidently forward, there was no trace of trail or road to be seen, nor any markers rising to guide the unknowing. It must be that the natives were like animals or birds on some of the other worlds which possessed ingrown direction skills.

They made no halt for nooning but as the sun shifted westward there began to show a line of dark marking the junction of sky and land ahead. It was toward that they continued doggedly even as the sun set and the quick dusk of Lochan closed in.

Still the caravan showed no signs of coming to a halt and the off-worlders were decidedly uncomfortable and tired. Then, out of the northern shadows, there shot a beam of light which flickered, Jofre decided after a moment’s watching, in a distinct pattern. He was aware of movement on the right-hand swing of the bearer ahead of him; the rider there, one of the yellow manes, had raised what looked like a thick stick. From the tip of that flashed in turn an answer to that flare ahead.

So announced they swung on into what was an encampment, nearly as large as the caravan itself as to numbers. There were no sod buildings here, rather stretches of woven reed mats set to form very crude tentlike enclosures. While awaiting them were not only members of the maned race, and robed Deves, but a new type of Lochanian native. These were short in size, hardly larger than the Jat, and armored—or shelled—with dull green carapacelike body covering from which a wide, also shielded head and thin knobby jointed limbs projected. They did not mingle with those who crowded forward to greet the caravaners, rather held off in a party to themselves.

Jofre, catching good sight of one standing just beneath one of the massed luminous moss torches of the camp, recognized this as a tribesman concerning which there had been a very short note in their scant study tapes. This was a Skrem, one of the nomads whose tribes drifted along the very edge of the Shattered land.

The off-worlders were glad to be able to slide down from their shaking conveyances and immediately sought the outer regions of the camp for relief. Even the issha training, Jofre decided, had not prepared him for such a journey as this had been. He drew a deep breath as he relatched his belt; even another fraction of a time mark might have been a disaster.

The small outlander party was left alone. Their luggage had been carelessly dumped as their bearers trudged mechanically away to the assembly of their own kind. There was no offer of any tent covering, but the three united in piling their equipment so that it gave a measure of shelter and they did not try to approach the low-burning fires which marked the fore of those misshapen tents. They had their trail rations and they selected small shares of those, knowing from the start they must take good care of the highly nourishing, if near-tasteless stuff, since living off the land might be impossible.

The caravaners apparently had a more robust meal to suit them. Joints of some unidentifiable meat were spitted over the fires and then portions sawed off with belt knives to please the diner. Bulging skins appeared also and were passed from hand to hand. The Lochanians, Jofre noted, were quite practiced in the tricky maneuver of throwing back the head and allowing a thick curl of liquid to flow from the lower bag end directly into their mouths.

This informal feasting was still in progress when a party of three approached the impromptu campsite of the off-worlders. Against the glow of one of the fires could be made out the unwieldy bulk of one who could only be the Axe of Rou, attended by one of the Deves, and scuttling along at his side one of the Skrem.

The three from off-world arose, the Jat pushing in behind Taynad, peering around her with timid curiosity.