Irsud (28 page)

“Or your spirits. Call on them.”

“You said that before. Spirits? I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Down there.” Aamunkoitta nodded at the mahazh. “I heard you. Heski, you said, or something like that. You said that and Heski or whatever it was swept us out safe.”

“Heski?” Aleytys rubbed her hands over her aching eyes. “I don't remember anything like that Heski?” She tried to remember because it sounded important, but there was nothing in her head like that, nothing at all. Shaking her tired head she raised up a little on her knees, then shifted her legs around until she was sitting, the earth cold even through the leather. Then through the cold, without displacing it, a warmth leaped through her, flowing up from the earth, up from the world itself, a welcoming soothing strengthening warmth even while she was beginning to tremble from the cold that struck clear to her bones. She spread her hands out flat on the ground on either side of her legs.

“Henkiolento maan,” Aamunkoitta breathed.

Aleytys paid little attention to her. A new calm, a new assurance was warm inside her. She reached out to the weapon and lifted it smoothly. Smoothly, surely she brought it down the cliff, swung it out over the treetops and brought it gently to rest in her lap. Reluctantly she lifted her hands from the earth, breaking the contact so that the warmth flowed away and she was shivering continuously. She got to her feet. “I've gotten out of the habit of enduring cold.”

Aamunkoitta jumped up. Eyes sparking, she touched the weapon, shivering a little in her awe. “An energy gun.”

Aleytys nodded. “I've a delivery to make. There's a … it's probably dangerous.”

The hiiri shrugged. “What isn't? But I think we should leave this place now.”

Aleytys shook her head. “No. But you can go if you want. I've got something to show the kipu.”

“Ahgh.” The sound was a low shapeless growl deep in the hiiri's throat.

“Come if you want.” Aleytys stepped across the stream again and stalked into the mahazh. She stopped by the bed.

Aamunkoitta frowned in puzzlement until Aleytys stripped the sheet from the bed and gathered it into a bundle with the stinting already decomposing embryo. Aleytys laughed angrily and bitterly. “A good present, don't you think, Kitten?”

“Good.” The hiiri opened her mouth in a fierce grin and a silent feral pleasure shone in her eyes. “Trade. A life for a life.”

The triumph spilled briefly out of Aleytys. “That's no balance,” she muttered. She crossed the room to the lift, clutching the improvised sack in one hand, the weapon in the other. Tucking the gun under her arm she pressed her hand over the panel. “No. To pay for that life …!” She leaned her forehead against the bluish stone. “Nothing's enough.”

The lift door slid open, releasing a flood of yellow light Aleytys set the bag on the floor. “Wait,” she said sharply. “I need something to buy passage.” She stepped past the hiiri. “Wait for me in there, will you?”

Without bothering about an answer she ran back into the bedroom. When she returned she had a large wooden box slung by soft ropes over her shoulder. “The queen's jewels,” she said briefly.

Aamunkoitta nodded approvingly. Then she glanced at the bag on the floor of the lift. “What now?”

“The kipu's nest.”

CHAPTER XXVII

Aleytys handed the sheet to Aamunkoitta. “You know what to do?” she whispered.

“Sure.” The hiiri's breathed answer was vibrant with excitement.

Flattening her hands against the warded metal Aleytys probed the lock. After a brief struggle she sucked in a deep breath, filling her lungs then letting the air trickle out again, her body relaxing, for the lock was unlocked, the wards neutralized. For a moment longer she rested, leaning on the hands pressed against the metal.

Then she jerked the door open and slid inside, energy gun levelled, the sensor under a quivering finger poised ready to fire. The kipu lay in a narrow bed in the narrow austere room, still sunk deep in sleep, her slow steady respirations the only sound. And it was no pretense. Aleytys felt the lowered life-beat, the placid steady throb of the sleep state. She slid her hand over the switch plate, filling the room with a sudden glare of light.

The kipu woke, jerked upright, stared open-mouthed at Aleytys standing beside the door. Aleytys saw her throat work, intelligence return to the narrow face.

“Don't bother,” she said in a soft silky whisper. “They can't hear you, not the shape they're in.”

The kipu looked at the gun held steady in Aleytys' hand. “If you kill me, you won't get out of the mahazh.”

Aleytys chuckled. She felt almost light-headed. “Not even a good try, kipu.”

The kipu plucked at the blanket, pulling it closer about her nude body, making her uneasy in her nakedness, feeling vulnerable and frightened in a way she'd never allowed herself to feel since her chilhood. Aleytys sensed this and laughed again, her bright blue-green eyes traveling derisively over the nayid's narrow upper body.

The kipu blushed, the red blood rising across her shoulders and face. She reached for the tunic folded neatly over the back of a chair placed with finicky precision exactly parallel to the bed.

Aleytys stiffened. “No.”

The round black eyes fixed on her unblinking. The thin body arm halted for a minute then the kipu calmly continued the movement, reaching for the tunic. “Don't be stupid, woman.”

A hot tight anger flared in Aleytys' chest For a moment she aimed the gun at the kipu's body then turned it aside. The flare crisped the tunic to ash, seared the kipu's hand and arm, burning it off halfway to the elbow, went on, ate away a deep bite out of the thick stone outer wall. “Now!” she hissed to Aamunkoitta.

Eyes glittering, a tight fierce smile on her small brown face, Aamunkoitta took a step forward and snapped the sheet open, flipping the dead embryo onto the moaning nayid's lap.

“Your queen,” Aleytys said softly. “Good bye, kipu.” She leveled the gun. “Good-bye.” The red flare licked out. Like Burash the kipu's straining body was a sudden black silhouette against the fire cone then nothing but a scattering of gray ash while the wall behind her let in air through a roundish jagged hole, air that stirred the ashes briefly and brought a flash of heat back into Aleytys' face.

She rubbed a shaking hand across her face, not feeling the fierce pleasure she expected, just a quiet sickness, a chill loneliness, a vast tiredness.

“Kunniakas.” Aamunkoitta tugged at her sleeve.

“Yes. I know.” Hitching up the fringed tunic, she tucked the energy gun into the belt holding up the leggings.

The lift took them to the barracks level. Cautiously they crept through a short length of corridor, meeting no one, then went up the coiling stairs to the green level of the armory.

Aleytys leaned against the whitewashed wall and closed her eyes. “Kitten, stay here. Keep an eye on those.” She touched the jewel box with her foot. “That's my way off this world.”

“Kunniakas, can't we leave?” The hiiri spread out her small hands, the three short fingers starred in a warding gesture. “You push your gods too hard, they go away. Gods are like that.”

“Gods.” Aleytys laughed bitterly. “Madar, I'm tired.” She held out her own hands and looked at them, rough, torn, ragged nails, hangnails. “These are my gods. Not so pretty, but strong.” She closed the hands into fists. “They do what I ask, not like the gods my people called on. Gods!” She turned around and stepped to the arch leading into the corridor. In the opening she looked back over her shoulder. “You hear trouble, I don't come back soon, get out of here. Take the jewels.”

“Kunniakas, let me come with you.” The hiiri clutched at her arm. “I can fight well as any man.”

“I believe you, Kitten.” She smiled affectionately into the small brown face, reached out and touched the firm lips tenderly. “The kitten has claws.” She shook her head. “No. I need someone I can trust here with these.”

Aamunkoitta sank disgustedly onto the box. She sniffed. But as Aleytys sped out of sight around the curve of the corridor, she breathed, “Henkiolenta maan carry you safe, Kunniakas.”

Aleytys got the armory door open, her talent working almost automatically now, smooth as breathing. She pulled it open and leaped inside, the single watchnayid crisping in the beam from the energy gun before she made a sound. Breathing shallowly, carefully not thinking of what she was doing, she swung the weapon full on over the sleeping guards, then left the piles of ash and pushed into the main storeroom of the arsenal.

Standing in the middle of the room she looked around at the heavy weapons neatly stacked and stored in niches in the wall. She knew what she wanted to do, but how to do it …
Madar
, she thought,
I don't understand weapons more complicated than a knife
.…

A vibration started in the back of her mind, a purple glow spread over the room, startling her, reminding her of the thing she found disturbing, the thing that avoided her memory, but there was so much pain in trying to search out what it was that she shied away from trying. The purple glow intensified and suddenly the knowledge she needed was there in her mind, clear and whole, like a page in a book.

Without questioning this, afraid to question it, determined not to question it, she sped to one of the larger niches filled with an ugly metal egg. Hands moving without needing direction from her mind, working with a knowledge in her fingertips, she armed the bomb. set a delay fuse, then moved to the next And the next And the next By the time she finished she had armed five bombs, left them alive quietly humming their songs of waiting power.…

Back at the stairwell, she saw Aamunkoitta's tense face relax, saw her make the blessing motion with her right hand. She laughed. “Gods! Come on, Kitten. To the roof.”

“The roof?” Aamunkoitta touched her arm hesitantly. “But.…”

“A skimmer, Kitten. How else.”

Aamunkoitta slipped the carrying ropes of the Jewel box over her shoulder. “You can fly one of those?”

“If I can't, we'll have one hell of funeral pyre, Kitten.”

Stair. Around and around. Unlock the massive double-locked door that led to the roof. Aleytys leaned against the metal, breathing hard. “I'm tired,” she said slowly. “Tired.”

“Can't you.…”

“The gods again?”

“No. Heal. Like when we rode from her the first time.”

“I really must be wiped out.” Aleytys closed her eyes and bathed in her river until her body tingled with life, her spirit soared high into a new excitement. Once, just once, the elation faltered, she heard Burash's light amused voice saying … up and down … up and down … moderation, Leyta, a little moderation.… She pushed the memory aside and laid her hands on Aamunkoitta's temples, sharing her power with her small friend. “That help?”

“Yes, Kunniakas.”

“Right When I go on the roof, wait in shelter behind the door.”

“Kunniakas!” The hiiri sounded indignant, her eyes flashed.

“Don't argue, Kitten. Those guards will have energy weapons, too. We don't need to give them lots of targets.”

Aamunkoitta looked stubborn.

“You'll just distract me, Kitten. I'll be worrying about you when I should be concentrating on the guards.” She held up the gun. “After all, we only have one weapon. And we haven't time to argue.”

Aamunkoitta caught hold of her arm. “What did you do, Kunniakas?”

Aleytys shrugged. “Set bombs to go in half an hour. About twenty minutes now.”

“Ah.” The hiiri's eyes glowed fiercely. “Burn the nest out. Good!”

“I'm sorry about your people here and in the city, Kitten.” Aleytys frowned, sliding down from her high. She shivered. “I didn't think of them till now.”

Aamunkoitta shrugged. “To kill the city they'd gladly die. Living here their lives were forfeit sooner or later anyway.” She put the jewel box down and settled herself on it. “But I'd rather not join them unless I have to. Hadn't you better stop talking and get busy?”

Amusement bubbling up in her again, washing out the depression, soaring on her way up again, Aleytys chuckled and ran out of the thick-walled tunnel, crouched low, keeping in the shadow next the parapet.

The guards were careless, too certain of the security behind them. There were only two of them and both stood backs to the entry, caught in a desultory conversation, alert in their way to danger from the sky but half their sense deadened by their casual words. Coolly Aleytys leveled the weapon and touched the sensor. The guards died in mid-word, not knowing where their death came from.

Aleytys grimaced. That too was getting easier, the killing, and it frightened her a little. But she didn't have the time to chew over philosophical problems and tucked the worry away to join all those other things she had no time or inclination to think about. “Kitten.”

The hiiri came from the tunnel, clumsy because of the one-sided weight of the jewel box. “That was fast.”

“They were dreaming.”

“Nakivas would have had their skins.” She looked around at the skimmers parked beside the jutting entry ramps. “What now?”

Aleytys shrugged. “I suppose it doesn't matter.” She stepped quickly to the nearest skimmer and ran up the ramp with the hiiri close behind.

With Aamunkoitta sitting uneasily beside her Aleytys settled into the pilot's seat. She ran her fingers over the varying textures of the metal and glass, all cool and mysterious to her touch. Then the purple glow came back and after a minute she grunted; hands danced over the controls so that the skimmer rose smoothly and darted away until the city was a dark blotch nestling against the paler stone of the butte. She swung the skimmer around and held it hovering. “Any minute now, Kitten.”