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“Four Thousand” Park announced.

“I suppose I could scream in
terror,” Iris told Taodor, not quite sounding as nonchalant as she intended,
“but it would get in the way of flying this wreck-waiting-to-happen. The
suspensors are having an effect. We’re decelerating.”

“There you go,” Park nodded to
everyone. “Told you this would work. Three thousand.”

“Self-congratulations are a bit
premature, dear,” Iris told him. “This is going to be very close.”

“You can do it,” Park assured
her. “Two Thousand.”

“I can do it, but can the buggy?”
Iris countered.

Park had no answer to that and
instead continued to observe the descent of the vehicle. It was only in the
last one thousand feet that the suspensors had an effect on their descent that
was noticeable without the instruments to measure the difference. Even so it
wasn’t quite enough. With the suspensors blasting out their full anti-gravitic
effect, the buggy came down hard into the surface of the inland sea known as
the Sink and continued downward about twenty feet.

Water sprayed explosively outward
and upward as the buggy dipped below the surface.
 
The roar of the water mixed with the sounds
of groaning metal and then the craft lifted back up and out of the sea again.
Iris finally brought the buggy to a halt some fifty feet over the water. “You
outsmarted yourself this time, Park,” she told him. Had we been over land, we
would have been dead.”

“Are you sure?” Park asked. “The
surface of the Sink gave way under the suspensors. Ground wouldn’t have.”

“My point exactly,” Iris
retorted. “We would have crashed. So next time you want to try ejecting from a
rocket ship, don’t.”

“But…” Park protested.

“Don’t!” Iris repeated.

For a change, Park actually shut
up, but he did turn around in his chair to see if anyone in the back supported
him. A glance at their expressions told him there would be no repeat performance
with any of them on board. He turned back and looked out the window. “Nice day
to go sailing, though,” he remarked. No one had anything to say to that either.

Of the entire party, only Taodore
and Marisea had ever visited an Atackack trade town. Even Tragackack and Tegack
had never had the experience. “As unclassed children there would have been no
reason for us to travel away from our nest-towns,” Tegack explained even as she
kept her eyes rotating around to take in the unfamiliar sights. “This is so
strange!”

Taodore had gone off with Park
and Iris to make contact with the trade-town’s leaders. A council of
experienced traders acted as the government for such towns and the members of
that council varied depending on how was in town at the moment.

“In what way?” Sartena asked.

“This place is almost like two
nest-towns built side by side,” Tegack marveled and gestured to the north.
“That side is where the Pakati traders stay and to the south you’ll find the
Totkeba traders. No Queens or even worker females, though. That seems even
stranger. In between they have built a neutral territory in which to trade.”

“I always thought the entire
trade town was supposed to be neutral territory,” Tragackack remarked.

“It is,” Marisea told them,
“theoretically, at least. Traders are part of the Shamanate and are trained not
to attack those of other tribes.”

“Traders are the lowest rank of
Shaman,” Tegack remarked.

“Snobbery?” Dannet asked.

“No, not at all,” Tegack replied
after a moment for her torc to define the term. “It is just the way it is.
Traders are unable to resist the smells of our females. However, they are also
well disposed to peaceful negotiations, most of the time, so long as there is
no female nearby at the time.”

“Even you?” Dannet asked.

“I have been trained not to emit
the gender smells,” Tegack replied, “what you call pheromones, that cause males
to defend territory, but you will find very few females here. I am probably the
only one.”

“There are not many females who
are also shamans,” Tragackack commented. “I know of none among the Geck.”

“There are two others I have met
who are Pakati,” Tegack informed him, “and I understand that there are over a
dozen such among the Bidachik. Is it not odd that their tribes produce more
female shamans than all the others combined?”

“Perhaps it is genetic,”
Tragackack shrugged, “but there will be none here, I think.”

“Why not?”Sartena asked

“Most Shaman-class Atackack
travel extensively,” Tragackack replied, “that is true. However, except for the
traders, we do not visit the trade-towns often unless on the way to somewhere
else.”

“You said the traders were the lowest
ranking shamans, though,” Dannet pointed out. “I still don’t understand why.”

“The most important attribute of
a shaman-class Atackack is his,” Tragackack paused and added, “or her, ability
to resist the pheromones that so govern the emotions of our people. The Traders
are those males who enter the shamanate who turn out not to be able to ignore
the smell. None are ejected from the ranks of shamans once they are initiated
so they are trained as traders. The female pheromones do not exist in the
trade-towns so they need never fear an embarrassing loss of control.”

“What about the female Atackack
shamans who cannot learn to control their pheromones?” Sartena asked. “They
cannot be traders can they?”

“They are given other duties
within the shamanate,” Tegack replied. “There is much to be done in our
nest-towns but it is a shame they cannot travel beyond our tribal lands.”

“Only one in five female
initiates fail to learn how to control the smell,” Tragackack told them,
adding, “eventually. Some learn how immediately like Tegack did. Some need
years to learn.”

“Once we learn the trick it is
easy to control,” Tegack told them, “until we reach a certain age. I believe
the human and Mer equivalent is menopause. Then for a year or so we cannot
control the pheromones. After that, we are too old to produce them.”

“So when you reach that age, you
take a year off?” Sartena asked.

“Whatever amount of time it takes
to complete the change,” Tegack replied. “Do not worry. I am still fairly
young. I shall not reach that time of life for many years yet.” She made a
“click-clack sound, than a moment later her torc translated as, “Oh! They’re
returning.”

They turned to see Park, Iris and
Taodore headed toward them with two Atackacks each wearing a green scarf. The
scarves were embroidered with the symbols of their respective tribes. One was Pakati
and the other Totkeba. They also each wore a thin gold chain around their
necks. The chain was a symbol of membership on the trade-town’s governing
council.

“Looks like we can continue on to
the next town down the coast,” Park told the rest as he got near enough. “No
non-Atackack have been here in over a year.”

“Why down the coast?” Marisea
asked. “There are other trade-towns inland of here aren’t there?”

“Keekah is the administrative
center for this province,” one of the Atackack traders told her. “All the other
trade-towns here send their reports to Keekah. If there had been human or Mer
visitors, we would know.”

“And you will spread the word
about possible Premm agents?” Park prompted him.

“Of course, Parker Holman,” the
Totkeba promised. “That is our part in the Prophecy.”

“Okactack has been here, I take
it?” Dannet commented dryly.

“All the nations of Atackack,”
the Totkeba replied earnestly, “know of the Okacktack’s Vision, even the
Kogacks, and all have their parts to play. The Pataki bobbed in the Atackack
form of a nod.

“Well, thank you, gentlemen,”
Park told them, “but this is just our first stop. If there have been no Premm
here, we can be in Bikick by late this afternoon. Are you sure the word will
spread among the Kogack tribes?”

“Slowly,” the Pataki predicted. “There
is only one small trade-town in this province that trades with Kogacks and they
have no permanent trade-towns of their own. The word will spread however.”

“If the Kogacks have no trade
town,” Sartena wondered, “then how…?”

“The Kogacks are
hunter-gatherers,” Taodore explained. “They have no towns, no settlements, just
bands that move from season to season. However, they do have places they know
they can go when they have trade in mind. Their traders will go to such places
and wait for others to arrive, but it would not be safe for a human or a Mer to
go there. The Kogacks would attack them on sight.”

“Even in a trade location?”
Dannet asked.

“Even so,” Taodore nodded. “A
respected shaman, like Okactack might gain access safely and if he were to
vouchsafe a stranger, they might get in and out of a trading place, but nothing
less would do. We don’t have to worry about Premm agents in Kogack territory.”

“So long as you are sure,” Dannet
told him uncertainly.

“Well, the Premm can try infiltrating
out there but it would be a waste of time. The Kogacks have very little contact
with the Mer and none at all with humans. As I understand it, the Premm are
trying to disrupt the warm relations between our three species, so an attack in
Kogack territory would not have much effect. Besides, the Kogacks don’t just
kill unwelcome outsiders you know, they eat them.”

“They do?” Dannet asked.

“Indeed,” Taodore confirmed.

“Do you think we could convince
the Premm to visit Kogack territory?” Dannet asked whimsically.

They spent the next few days
traveling from trade-town to trade-town. There were several notable towns along
the Totkeba-Geck border where it was known humans and Mer sometimes traded, but
none of them had been visited by other than Atackack in recent months.

They spent two days at Pikita in
the mountains between Totkeba, Geck and Bidichik territories, because it was a
particularly busy town. Pikita was also the only trade-town that was divided
into three parts rather than the usual two. It was here, for the first time on
their trip, that Tragackack and Tegack had to explain their academic robes to
other Atackack. The traders in Pikita and other towns had been disinterested in
the garb, correctly assuming the two scholars were shamans of an obscure class.
“They may have assumed we were ambassadors,” Tragackack told Park when he asked.
“Ambasador-class robes vary depending on who one represents and to whom they
are ambassadors.”

In Pikita, however, they
encountered a pair of gray and red-robed counsellors and a rainbow-garbed teller
who were interested in the unusual robes the two scholars wore. It turned out
the teller was Kractitoc, the same teller Okactack had first introduced the
humans to in southern Africa. “Been a few years since we last saw you,” Park
commented to Kractitoc. “What have you been up to?”

“I have been a teller, Parker
Holman,” Kractitoc replied. “I go from place to place and spread the word
through song and story. I have mostly stayed within the lands of the Atackack, but
have twice consulted with the wise men and women of the Mer in Takikita,”

“That’s our next stop,” Park
admitted and continued to explain about the Premm agents on Earth.

“I will spread the word about
these humans who are not our humans,” Kractitoc assured Park. “I feel secure
that we can tell the difference between a true human and an imposter.”

“They think they are the only
true humans,” Dannet put in.

“They are mistaken,” the teller
replied with religious confidence.

“I thought all us humans pretty
much looked alike to you,” Sartena added.

“You do,” Kractitoc bobbed a nod
of agreement, “but you do not smell alike. Smell is vital to Atackack life. It
is how we know family, friends and enemies. Will you take me to Takikita,
Parker Holman?”

“If you want,” Park shrugged. “We
were planning to leave in the morning. I imagine there are a lot of towns
you’ll be skipping between here and there if you travel with us.”

“Takikita is the best place to
start, however,” the teller replied. “No other trade-town has so many people
passing through.”

“I would have thought Pikita was
more centralized, especially with traders from three tribal lands,” Park noted.

“But I am here now,” Kractitoc
pointed out. “By morning I will have told everyone who needs to know here.”

“Good enough,” Park told him.
“We’ll give you a ride to Takikita.”

They flew out from Pikita just
after dawn, by following a thin mountain stream that grew rapidly larger by
merging with tributaries as they headed downslope. “Be careful, Iris Fain,”
Kractitoc warned her as she drove the buggy barely a thousand feet about ground
level. “In the local language this river is called ‘Plunge into Death.’”

“Picturesque name,” Iris allowed.
“Why is that?”

Before the teller could explain,
the ground rose slightly before them with the river cutting a canyon through
the landscape and then just as suddenly dropped over three thousand feet. The buggy
suddenly dropped as well and Iris worked quickly to bring it back under her
control. “A little more warning might have been appreciated,” she told the
Atackack teller once she stopped their descent.

“I apologize,” Kractitoc replied.
“I have never seen the land from this perspective. I did not realize we were so
close to the edge, but is the waterfall not spectacular?”

“I haven’t had a chance to enjoy
the view,” she replied, bringing the buggy around to take a look back in the
direction from which they had come. “Nice view,” she admitted. “Park, what are
you doing?”

Park was fiddling with the
controls on his side of the buggy, but not ones that had anything to do with
navigation. “Just taking a few pictures,” he replied. “I think a recording of
the Death Falls here would look nice on the wall over the mantle back home,
don’t you? Just took at that. Almost three thousand feet in a single drop and I
think we got very lucky.”