After the lesson was over he was no longer convinced he wanted to join the Vada and learn how to fight. His muscles hurt so very much!
“Same bell tomorrow,” announced Vandiel. “You are doing well. Now go and do something, anything at all as long as you don’t get into any trouble. One last point - don’t let your muscles stiffen or it you’ll feel worse tomorrow.”
With a dismissing nod he strode off, intent on finding out how Monika and Mlei were doing and to hear the latest reports from the away teams.
Mikey didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry.
* * * * *
Anne and Lastair had been getting samples of the local flora and fauna, intending to take them back with them to Tak so that they could be analysed for potential medical properties - a laudable intention. They were very aware however that their medical duties came first. Their Lind kept a telepathic ear open for emergency calls.
When the call came that the First Vadryz had met with an accident, they were ready.
Cera and her vadeln-pairs had been allocated the southern route, potentially, in Vandiel and Zandya’s opinion the most dangerous. They had been given it because she and Xei were the most experienced leaders.
To the south lay the area where the Diaglon’s landing site had been during their exploratory and assessment mission.
What Vandiel hadn’t realised at the time was that the route itself was a dangerous one, being rocky and full of rivers and chasms.
The accident should have been fatal to one if not to all.
Negotiating a ravine two vadeln-pairs fell, the Lind halves scrabbling with their paws and chelas extended for purchase on the rapidly crumbling rock.
Luckily for them there was a rock shelf not many lind-lengths down and there they landed.
Xei immediately telepathed news of the accident back to Zandya at the headquarters dom.
: The Holad are on their way : he informed Cera who was busily undoing the rope that had been twisted round her waist. She was shouting out instructions to her other five vadeln-pairs.
By the time the Holad arrived, the two injured vadeln-pairs had been rescued from their shelf of safety and their bruises and broken bones were being tended to. Every vadeln knew how to perform emergency medical aid.
Vandiel and Zandya decided that not just the injured should return to the dom.
* * * * *
When they left the headquarters dom, Thalia had looked behind and spied a number of wistful faces, especially those of Katie and Kenlei. Mikey had looked as if he was about to burst into tears.
: Rodick, take point : ordered Josei as they left and Rodick and Anya took the lead. Thalia usually left Josei to direct this type of deployment, he was far better at exploring and tracking than she was. Of course he and she shared command of the Second Vadryz. Halves of vadeln-pairs rarely thought of themselves as single entities. What Josei thought Thalia also thought and although they might disagree on some matters it was extremely rare for them to disagree about anything really important.
Thalia settled herself into a comfortable position and prepared to enjoy the ride. Every few bells Josei changed the point position, with him and Thalia sometimes taking the lead and at other times Zeb and Vya. Being ex-Avuzdel, a semi-secret Lind undercover unit that had operated back on Rybak, Vya was very experienced at leading, finding and more importantly, at not being seen doing it.
Towards dawn Thalia ordered that they find a place to rest and to eat. She intended that they should set out again after midday. Dark was best for remaining concealed but it was more difficult for trackers to find evidence of the strangers if any had been moving around in the vicinity.
: We can move faster in the daylight and we’ll be less likely to miss something : she told Josei and he agreed.
: I will set the guard : he informed her : unless you wish to? :
: Go right ahead : she ‘grinned’ in his mind, knowing just what vadeln-pair would be detailed to take first spot. Josei had been complaining left, right and centre about one of the members of the group.
There were seven vadeln-pairs under her and Josei’s command. As well as Rodick, Zeb and Christel there were another four men, the twins Jack and Jon, Ail, he and Iya had been in the year group behind Thalia and Josei during their cadet days and old Hael, who was nearing retirement age.
It was Hael and his Lind Mariya who were getting on Josei’s nerves but mostly the former. Hael was nearing sixty and the joint-ache was beginning to seep into his battle-worn joints. His Lind Mariya, who had once possessed a coat with the most beautiful purple-striped markings, was turning white, as did the majority of Lind once they had attained the great age of fifty summers. The enforced inaction aboard the Aikko had made Hael’s joints stiffen. He was finding the long ride difficult and had been keeping up a low grumbling since they had left the headquarters dom.
Josei had been irritated although he was being very careful not to show it. He respected Mariya and did not wish to upset her. It was not she who was complaining but her rider.
: Hael’s aching bones do not relieve him from guard duty : agreed Josei with a crooked grin of pure devilment.
: Just make sure he’s relieved, by us, after a bell : she ‘said’, thus reminding him of his duty of care for those under his command.
Surprisingly Hael didn’t cavil against the order. In a strange sort of way he looked pleased. Josei was taken aback and being Josei couldn’t let it lie. The answer, when it came surprised him and it was a chastened Lind who passed on the reason why to his life-partner.
: Mariya says he is pleased to be asked. He was grumbling because he was worried about being able to keep up with us younger ones. Now he feels needed again. He thought we would think him too tired to stand watch. And before you say anything - lesson learned :
They all had something to eat. It was dry, travel rations but Thalia earned their eternal gratitude when she extracted sixteen ripe red fruits from her pack.
Although the staple diet of the Lind was meat, preferably raw, they also needed, as did their human counterparts, a varied diet in order to stay healthy. Red fruit was the juiciest, tastiest fruit that grew on Tak. The fruit plants they had brought with them from their home planet, including the original red fruit, had not done well in the Tak soil. It was too moist and was lacking in necessary minerals. These were tasty substitutes.
After they had eaten and visited the necessary (the job of digging the hole had fallen to the two youngest, Christel and Zeb) they all got some sleep and most of them woke up refreshed.
Thalia did not sleep well although by the snoring noise emanating from Josei she deduced during her periods of wakefulness that he was. The soft, soothing feelings emanating from his mind rather bore this out. Worries about command responsibilities were not affecting him.
This was her first, big test of her abilities as Vadryzka and she was worrying that she wouldn’t be good enough or able enough to lead her people and Lind through it.
Had she but known that it was a worry that hit nearly all of the newly promoted. She was doing fine. Josei wouldn’t have been sleeping so soundly if she was not.
Just after midday they set out again.
Before they left, Thalia and Josei made their first active service report to Vandiel and Zandya. So far they had found nothing but were carrying on in their allocated direction. None of the other away teams had found anything yet either.
Hael and Mariya were riding point, Thalia and Josei having listened to and acted on Mariya’s pleadings. They were proving to be very good, very good indeed.
Thalia remembered something her older brother Hal had told her when she had been a girl.
“Age, infirmity and experience wins over youth, enthusiasm and ignorance every time. Remember that Thalia, it will stand you in good stead.”
He had been right.
She sighed. She hadn’t been able to say a proper goodbye to Hal and Aya before they had embarked. They, with the Thirtieth Ryzck and a grou
p of Holad had left Stronghold last dry season for the Nadlians of the Larg, there to set up the first Supply and Holad Station there. Thalia and Hal’s youngest sister Tara, with her Lind Kolyei, were there too, as they belonged to the Thirtieth Ryzck. She wished she had been able to have a talk with Tara as well.
Still, she would see them when she and Josei returned home.
Home. Tak. For the first time since she had left her birth planet Thalia realised that Tak, not Rybak was her home.
* * * * *
The warning came out of the blue.
: Mariya says to stop and dismount :
Josei’s telepathic message jolted Thalia out of her musings.
As one the six vadeln-pairs behind her and Josei stopped and the riders dismounted. Thalia unclipped her sword guard accompanied by a momentary laugh to herself. Even though they were equipped with a firearm each it was the sword hilt that every vadeln reached for first.
“What’s up?” she asked, carefully creeping forward to join Hael and Mariya, Josei’s paws tripping at her heels.
Hael turned. “We are not alone on the planet.” He pointed at the ground. “Do you see what I see?”
“Remnants of a fire.”
“Precisely, and fire means people.”
“People?”
“For lack of better information as to what and who the strangers are,” answered Hael, “People is as good a word as any.”
“How long ago?” she asked.
He knelt down and examined the ashes. “I’d say about a tenday, perhaps more,” he said at last. He stirred the ashes around with his knife. “They cooked food on it. See here? These pieces? That’s burnt bone.”
“So they are meat eaters.”
“That lets out the Vlon,” he agreed. “They’re vegetarian.”
The Diaglon and the Vlon were allies but Thalia knew that ‘trust’ was not a part of their mutual accommodation pact.
One question answered, thought Thalia. No one had been a hundred per cent sure that the strangers hadn’t been the Vlon themselves, playing some sort of convoluted political or military trick. It would have been like them. Now for the second question.
“Tracks?”
“Going off that way,” Hael answered, pointing to the southwest, in an almost identical direction to their planned route.
“Two footed or four?”
Hael, Thalia hadn’t realised until this tvan just how good a tracker he really was, walked a few steps, his eyes fixed firmly on the ground.
“Two at least,” he said at last. “But perhaps as many as four or five.”
“You think they could be human, like us?” queried Rodick, approaching the ashes of the fire.
“The tracks are too smudged to tell. The mud underneath is shallow which makes any tracks faint. The wind’s been blowing and has swept most of the leaves away too,” answered Hael.
“It’s very unlikely,” Thalia commented. “I wish the Brai had been able to make sensors small and light enough for us to carry. So what do we do now?”
“We report our findings,” answered Hael.
* * * * *
Thalia decided that to remain round the fire was not the most sensible option. Caution was the better part of valour.
They withdrew to under a thick canopy of foliage and set up their dom. The branches and stalks were very manageable and soon eight, small, individual dagas were taking shape. These cone-like structures were the traditional homes of the Lind. They were wind-tight and rainproof once the humans had made sure that every little bit of the sloping roof was covered with leaves clipped on to each other so they would not blow away.
Each vadeln-pair, except the duo on guard crept in beneath their growing roof with joint sighs of relief.
Josei made telepathic contact with Zandya at the headquarters dom and the Second Vadryz was ordered to wait for reinforcements before they went any further. To their surprise it wasn’t Cera’s First Vadryz they were to await but the group led by Artem and Larya. When they arrived Artem and Larya would assume command. They had the experience of leading whereas Thalia and Josei did not. They found out later about the accident at the ravine and that the First Vadryz were on their way back to the headquarters dom.
Thalia wasn’t at all unhappy about losing command to Artem. The situation was getting complicated as well as dangerous and it would be good to have the benefit of his experience. She was worried she might make wrong and potentially fatal decisions and that the worry itself might affect her judgement.
Artem arrived early the next morning.
“I might have known it would be you who would find them first,” he greeted Thalia as he led his miniature command into the dom.
“It wasn’t me,” answered Thalia. “It was Hael.”
“Hael, eh?” Artem winked at the elderly vadeln. “You can still show these young ones.”
“Indeed I can,” laughed Hael. He was looking much taller than he had been looking of late, taller and sprightlier.
* * * * *
Mikey got his promised trip with Belu but it didn’t turn out to be uneventful one that Vandiel and Belu had planned. It started simply enough.
Mikey arrived at the wallow where Belu had set up his temporary daga (of necessity twice the size of the dagas built by the others) and bowed respectfully. He was rather in awe of the Brai. It took a lot of presence to make Mikey feel in awe of anything or anybody and Belu had ‘presence’ in full measure.
“Mikey,” Belu greeted him with a smile. Mikey was hopping round from one foot to the other and he thought this antic hilariously amusing. “Ready to fly?”
“Yes please,” The boy’s words were uttered so fervently that Belu’s giant laugh boomed out.
“Come along then.” He lowered his body and Mikey began to climb up his back leg and on to his back. He was so eager to get there as fast as he could that his feet kept slipping and Belu had to ask him to slow down.
“More hurry less speed young Mikey,” he said.
At last, under Belu’s directions he got there and crawled up to behind his neck where there was a number of leather riding straps. Mikey fastened them round his body very tightly.
Once Belu was satisfied he wouldn’t fall out of the restraints he commanded Mikey to hold on tight and wings extended, began to run.
Mikey held his breath as Belu took off. Slowly, they climbed upwards, the angle of ascent increasing until Mikey began to panic that they were ascending vertically and that they were flying straight for the sun. They began to soar through the air and Mikey plucked up enough courage to look down. Everything looked so very tiny and he couldn’t make out the area where the headquarters dom was located. He felt the wind on his face and it whistling past his ears, then they reached the level of the clouds and the whistling stopped
Mikey held on to the straps for dear life but he had never felt more alive than he did at this moment.
Belu waltzed in the still sky, rising and falling.
The ground was so far away and Mikey caught glimpses of the foliage and rivers, hills and mountains.
He was flying! It was as if he was falling but not falling, spinning but not spinning and he was positive he weighed absolutely nothing.
Belu tucked in his wings and they swooped downwards then he extended them and they began to climb.
Mikey screamed a scream of pure exhilarated pleasure.
He knew what that man had meant when he wrote down his words about flying now. As he had copied the notes of his brother Charles he hadn’t fully understood when the author had written, ‘Once one has flown one will ever after walk with one’s gaze looking skywards towards where one has visited and to where one longs to go again.’
Understanding had come.
He wanted Belu to keep flying forever.
All of the Brai were very aware of the slightest alterations in the patterns in the air. Belu felt the minute change at the tips of his wings first and tensed. There was a pressure forming and it was growing. It w
as not a natural phenomenon.
Instantly, Belu veered round and wings frantically flapping, made directly for the headquarters dom. He reached it within three tvans. Hovering above, he shouted out a warning, at the same time ordering Mikey to the ground. The boy dropped like a stone for a height of about a lind-length once Belu told him to jump.
“I go to find out,” Belu bellowed as he flew away. “Quorkos. It has the feel of them …” His last words faded away into nothing.
Katie, who had been watching Belu’s rapid descent, turned to Mikey.
“I’m not sure,” faltered Mikey, answering her unspoken question. “All of a sudden Belu brought me back. I couldn’t hear much of what he was saying. The wind was whipping the words away but I think he was talking about strangers and Quorkos.”
They could all hear what sounded like explosions in the distance.
Everyone was hurrying to get the supplies under the shelter of the foliage and out of sight..
“You hurt?” demanded Vandiel of Mikey as he strode over and hauled him to his feet. He whirled to look south as a series of explosions rent the air.
“I’m fine,” Mikey shouted.
“Good. Katie!”
“Ryzcka?”
“You and Kenlei take Mikey and go!” ordered Vandiel, thrusting a dazed Mikey in her direction. “Mikey, go with Katie this instant!”
Vandiel turned, seeking out the next duo on his mental list. Everyone was working feverishly. Belu hadn’t definitely said there were Quorkos coming but they had all heard the explosions and any moment they were expecting to hear the steady throb, throb, throb of their engines.
“Tavin and Whufflya!” shouted out Vandiel. “You two take as much as you can of your firearm repair equipment and follow Katie and Kenlei. Hurry up. There’s no time to lose.”
Tavin nodded and with Max’s help began bundling equipment into packs. He headed towards Whufflya who was standing waiting.
“Max,” shouted Vandiel. “You too. Get as much as you can and go find Cera and Xei. The rest of you, move it, get these supplies away. Are the wounded under cover?”