CHAPTER FIFTEEN
He hadn't changed much in six years. His face _was_ worse than mine; hehadn't had the plastic surgeons of Terran Intelligence doing their bestfor him. His mouth, I thought fleetingly, must hurt like hell when hedrew it up into the kind of grin he was grinning now. His eyebrows,thick and fierce with gray in them, went up as he saw Miellyn; but hebacked away to let us enter, and shut the door behind us.
The room was bare and didn't look as if it had been lived in much. Thefloor was stone, rough-laid, a single fur rug laid before a brazier. Alittle girl was sitting on the rug, drinking from a big double-handledmug, but she scrambled to her feet as we came in, and backed against thewall, looking at us with wide eyes.
She had pale-red hair like Juli's, cut straight in a fringe across herforehead, and she was dressed in a smock of dyed red fur that almostmatched her hair. A little smear of milk like a white moustache clung toher upper lip where she had forgotten to wipe her mouth. She was aboutfive years old, with deep-set dark eyes like Juli's, that watched megravely without surprise or fear; she evidently knew who I was.
"Rindy," Rakhal said quietly, not taking his eyes from me. "Go into theother room."
Rindy didn't move, still staring at me. Then she moved toward Miellyn,looking up intently not at the woman, but at the pattern of embroideriesacross her dress. It was very quiet, until Rakhal added, in a gentle andcuriously moderate voice, "Do you still carry a skean, Race?"
I shook my head. "There's an ancient proverb on Terra, about blood beingthicker than water, Rakhal. That's Juli's daughter. I'm not going tokill her father right before her eyes." My rage spilled over then, and Ibellowed, "To hell with your damned Dry-town feuds and your filthy ToadGod and all the rest of it!"
Rakhal said harshly, "Rindy. I told you to get out."
"She needn't go." I took a step toward the little girl, a wary eye onRakhal. "I don't know quite what you're up to, but it's nothing for achild to be mixed up in. Do what you damn please. I can settle with youany time.
"The first thing is to get Rindy out of here. She belongs with Juli and,damn it, that's where she's going." I held out my arms to the littlegirl and said, "It's over, Rindy, whatever he's done to you. Your mothersent me to find you. Don't you want to go to your mother?"
Rakhal made a menacing gesture and warned, "I wouldn't--"
Miellyn darted swiftly between us and caught up the child in her arms.Rindy began to struggle noiselessly, kicking and whimpering, but Miellyntook two quick steps, and flung an inner door open. Rakhal took a stridetoward her. She whirled on him, fighting to control the furious littlegirl, and gasped, "Settle it between you, without the baby watching!"
Through the open door I briefly saw a bed, a child's small dresseshanging on a hook, before Miellyn kicked the door shut and I heard alatch being fastened. Behind the closed door Rindy broke into angryscreams, but I put my back against the door.
"She's right. We'll settle it between the two of us. What have you doneto that child?"
"If you thought--" Rakhal stopped himself in midsentence and stoodwatching me without moving for a minute. Then he laughed.
"You're as stupid as ever, Race. Why, you fool, I knew Juli would runstraight to you, if she was scared enough. I knew it would bring you outof hiding. Why, you damned fool!" He stood mocking me, but there was astrained fury, almost a frenzy of contempt behind the laughter.
"You filthy coward, Race! Six years hiding in the Terran zone. Sixyears, and I gave you six months! If you'd had the guts to walk outafter me, after I rigged that final deal to give you the chance, wecould have gone after the biggest thing on Wolf. And we could havebrought it off together, instead of spending years spying and dodgingand hunting! And now, when I finally get you out of hiding, all you wantto do is run back where you'll be safe! I thought you had more guts!"
"Not for Evarin's dirty work!"
Rakhal swore hideously. "Evarin! Do you really believe--I might haveknown he'd get to you too! That girl--and you've managed to wreck all Idid there, too!" Suddenly, so swiftly my eyes could hardly follow, hewhipped out his skean and came at me. "Get away from that door!"
I stood my ground. "You'll have to kill me first. And I won't fight you,Rakhal. We'll settle this, but we'll do it my way for once, likeEarthmen."
"_Son of the Ape!_ Get your skean out, you stinking coward!"
"I won't do it, Rakhal." I stood and defied him. I had outmaneuveredDry-towners in a _shegri_ bet. I knew Rakhal, and I knew he would notknife an unarmed man. "We fought once with the _kifirgh_ and it didn'tsettle anything. This time we'll do it my way. I threw my skean awaybefore I came here. I won't fight."
He thrust at me. Even I could see that the blow was a feint, and I had aflashing, instantaneous memory of Dallisa's threat to drive the knifethrough my palms. But even while I commanded myself to stand steady,sheer reflex threw me forward, grabbing at his wrist and the knife.
Between my grappling hand he twisted and I felt the skean drive home,rip through my jacket with a tearing sound; felt the thin fine line oftouch, not pain yet, as it sliced flesh. Then pain burned through myribs and I felt hot blood, and I wanted to kill Rakhal, wanted to get myhands around his throat and kill him with them. And at the same time Iwas raging because I didn't want to fight the crazy fool, I wasn't evenmad at him.
Miellyn flung the door open, shrieking, and suddenly the Toy, released,was darting a small whirring droning horror, straight at Rakhal's eyes.I yelled. But there was no time even to warn him. I bent and butted himin the stomach. He grunted, doubled up in agony and fell out of the pathof the diving Toy. It whirred in frustration, hovered.
He writhed in agony, drawing up his knees, clawing at his shirt, while Iturned on Miellyn in immense fury--and stopped. Hers had been a move ofdesperation, an instinctive act to restore the balance between aweaponless man and one who had a knife. Rakhal gasped, in a hoarse voicewith all the breath gone from it:
"Didn't want to use. Rather fight clean--" Then he opened his closedfist and suddenly there were _two_ of the little whirring droninghorrors in the room and this one was diving at me, and as I threw myselfheadlong to the floor the last puzzle-piece fell into place: Evarin hadmade the same bargain with Rakhal as with me!
I rolled over, dodging. Behind me in the room there was a child's shrillscream: "Daddy! Daddy!" And abruptly the birds collapsed in midair andwent limp. They fell to the floor like dropping stones and lay therequivering. Rindy dashed across the room, her small skirts flying, andgrabbed up one of the terrible vicious things in either hand.
"Rindy!" I bellowed. "No!"
She stood shaking, tears pouring down her round cheeks, a Toy squeezedtight in either hand. Dark veins stood out almost black on her fairtemples. "Break them, Daddy," she implored in a little thread of avoice. "Break them, _quick_. I can't hang on...."
Rakhal staggered to his feet like a drunken man and snatched one of theToys, grinding it under his heel. He made a grab at the second, reeledand drew an anguished breath. He crumpled up, clutching at his bellywhere I'd butted him. The bird screamed like a living thing.
Breaking my paralysis of horror I leaped up, ran across the room,heedless of the searing pain along my side. I snatched the bird fromRindy and it screamed and shrilled and died as my foot crunched the tinyfeathers. I stamped the still-moving thing into an amorphous mess andkept on stamping and smashing until it was only a heap of powder.
Rakhal finally managed to haul himself upright again. His face was sopale that the scars stood out like fresh burns.
"That was a foul blow, Race, but I--I know why you did it." He stoppedand breathed for a minute. Then he muttered, "You ... saved my life, youknow. Did you know you were doing it, when you did it?"
Still breathing hard, I nodded. Done knowingly, it meant an end ofblood-feud. However we had wronged each other, whatever the pledges. Ispoke the words that confirmed it and ended it, finally and forever:
"There is a life between us. Let it stand for a death."
&n
bsp; Miellyn was standing in the doorway, her hands pressed to her mouth, hereyes wide. She said shakily, "You're walking around with a knife in yourribs, you fool!"
Rakhal whirled and with a quick jerk he pulled the skean loose. It hadsimply been caught in my shirtcloak, in a fold of the rough cloth. Hepulled it away, glanced at the red tip, then relaxed. "Not more than aninch deep," he said. Then, angrily, defending himself: "You did ityourself, you ape. I was trying to get rid of the knife when you jumpedme."
But I knew that and he knew I knew it. He turned and scooped up Rindy,who was sobbing noisily. She dug her head into his shoulder and I madeout her strangled words. "The other Toys hurt you when I was mad atyou...." she sobbed, rubbing her fists against smeared cheeks. "I--Iwasn't that mad at you. I wasn't that mad at anybody, not even ... him."
Rakhal pressed his hand against his daughter's fleecy hair and said,looking at me over her head, "The Toys activate a child's subconsciousresentments against his parents--I found out that much. That also meansa child can control them for a few seconds. No adult can." A strangerwould have seen no change in his expression, but I knew him, and saw.
"Juli said you threatened Rindy."
He chuckled and set the child on her feet. "What else could I say thatwould have scared Juli enough to send her running to you? Juli's proud,almost as proud as you are, you stiff-necked Son of the Ape." The insultdid not sting me now.
"Come on, sit down and let's decide what to do, now we've finished upthe old business." He looked remotely at Miellyn and said, "You must beDallisa's sister? I don't suppose your talents include knowing how tomake coffee?"
They didn't, but with Rindy's help Miellyn managed, and while they wereout of the room Rakhal explained briefly. "Rindy has rudimentary ESP.I've never had it myself, but I could teach her something--notmuch--about how to use it. I've been on Evarin's track ever since thatbusiness of The Lisse.
"I'd have got it sooner, if you were still working with me, but Icouldn't do anything as a Terran agent, and I had to be kicked out sothoroughly that the others wouldn't be afraid I was still workingsecretly for Terra. For a long time I was just chasing rumors, but whenRindy got big enough to look in the crystals of Nebran, I started makingsome progress.
"I was afraid to tell Juli; her best safety was the fact that she didn'tknow anything. She's always been a stranger in the Dry-towns." Hepaused, then said with honest self-evaluation, "Since I left the SecretService I've been a stranger there myself."
I asked, "What about Dallisa?"
"Twins have some ESP to each other. I knew Miellyn had gone to theToymaker. I tried to get Dallisa to find out where Miellyn had gone,learn more about it. Dallisa wouldn't risk it, but Kyral saw me withDallisa and thought it was Miellyn. That put him on my tail, too, and Ihad to leave Shainsa. I was afraid of Kyral," he added soberly. "Afraidof what he'd do. I couldn't do anything without Rindy and I knew if Itold Juli what I was doing, she'd take Rindy away into the Terran Zone,and I'd be as good as dead."
As he talked, I began to realize how vast a web Evarin and theunderground organization of Nebran had spread for us. "Evarin was heretoday. What for?"
Rakhal laughed mirthlessly. "He's been trying to get us to kill eachother off. That would get rid of us both. He wants to turn over Wolf tothe nonhumans entirely, I think he's sincere enough, but"--he spread hishands helplessly--"I can't sit by and see it."
I asked point-blank, "Are you working for Terra? Or for the Dry-towns?Or any of the anti-Terran movements?"
"I'm working for _me_", he said with a shrug. "I don't think much of theTerran Empire, but one planet can't fight a galaxy. Race, I want justone thing. I want the Dry-towns and the rest of Wolf, to have a voice intheir own government. Any planet which makes a substantial contributionto galactic science, by the laws of the Terran Empire, is automaticallygiven the status of an independent commonwealth.
"If a man from the Dry-towns discovers something like a mattertransmitter, Wolf gets dominion status. But Evarin and his gang want tokeep it secret, keep it away from Terra, keep it locked up in placeslike Canarsa! Somebody has to get it away from them. And if I do it, Iget a nice fat bonus, and an official position."
I believed that, where I would have suspected too much protestation ofaltruism. Rakhal tossed it aside.
"You've got Miellyn to take you through the transmitters. Go back to theMastershrine, and tell Evarin that Race Cargill is dead. In the TradeCity they think I'm Cargill, and I can get in and out as I choose--sorryif it caused you trouble, but it was the safest thing I could thinkof--and I'll 'vise Magnusson and have him send soldiers to guard thestreet-shrines. Evarin might try to escape through one of them."
I shook my head. "Terra hasn't enough men on all Wolf to cover thestreet-shrines in Charin alone. And I can't go back with Miellyn." Iexplained. Rakhal pursed his lips and whistled when I described thefight in the transmitter.
"You have all the luck, Cargill! I've never been near enough even to besure how they work--and I'll bet you didn't begin to understand! We'llhave to do it the hard way, then. It won't be the first time we'vebulled our way through a tight place! We'll face Evarin in his ownhideout! If Rindy's with us, we needn't worry."
I was willing to let him assume command, but I protested, "You'd take achild into that--that--"
"What else can we do? Rindy can control the Toys, and neither you nor Ican do that, if Evarin should decide to throw his whole arsenal at us."He called Rindy and spoke softly to her. She looked from her father tome, and back again to her father, then smiled and stretched out her handto me.
Before we ventured into the street, Rakhal scowled at the sprawledembroideries of Miellyn's robe. He said, "In those things you show uplike a snowfall in Shainsa. If you go out in them, you could be mobbed.Hadn't you better get rid of them now?"
"I can't," she protested. "They're the keys to the transmitter!"
Rakhal looked at the conventionalized idols with curiosity, but saidonly, "Cover them up in the street, then. Rindy, find her something toput over her dress."
When we reached the street-shrine, Miellyn admonished: "Stand closetogether on the stones. I'm not sure we can all make the jump at once,but we'll have to try."
Rakhal picked up Rindy and hoisted her to his shoulder. Miellyn droppedthe cloak she had draped over the pattern of the Nebran embroideries,and we crowded close together. The street swayed and vanished and I feltthe now-familiar dip and swirl of blackness before the worldstraightened out again. Rindy was whimpering, dabbing smeary fists ather face. "Daddy, my nose is bleeding...."
Miellyn hastily bent and wiped the blood from the snubby nose. Rakhalgestured impatiently.
"The workroom. Wreck everything you see. Rindy, if anything starts tocome at us, you stop it. Stop it quick. And"--he bent and took thelittle face between his hands--"_chiya_, remember they're not toys, nomatter how pretty they are."
Her grave gray eyes blinked, and she nodded.
Rakhal flung open the door of the elves' workshop with a shout. Theringing of the anvils shattered into a thousand dissonances as I kickedover a workbench and half-finished Toys crashed in confusion to thefloor.
The dwarfs scattered like rabbits before our assault of destruction. Ismashed tools, filigree, jewels, stamping everything with my heavyboots. I shattered glass, caught up a hammer and smashed crystals. Therewas a wild exhilaration to it.
A tiny doll, proportioned like a woman, dashed toward me, shrilling in asupersonic shriek. I put my foot on her and ground the life out of her,and she screamed like a living woman as she came apart. Her blue eyesrolled from her head and lay on the floor watching me. I crushed theblue jewels under my heel.
Rakhal swung a tiny hound by the tail. Its head shattered into debris ofalmost-invisible gears and wheels. I caught up a chair and wrecked aglass cabinet of parts with it, swinging furiously. A berserk madness ofsmashing and breaking had laid hold on me.
I was drunk with crushing and shattering and ruining, when I heardMiellyn scream a warning
and turned to see Evarin standing in thedoorway. His green cat-eyes blazed with rage. Then he raised both handsin a sudden, sardonic gesture, and with a loping, inhuman glide, racedfor the transmitter.
"Rindy," Rakhal panted, "can you block the transmitter?"
Instead Rindy shrieked. "We've got to get out! The roof is falling down!The house is going to fall down on us! The roof, look at the roof!"
I looked up, transfixed by horror. I saw a wide rift open, saw theskylight shatter and break, and daylight pouring through the crackingwalls, Rakhal snatched Rindy up, protecting her from the falling debriswith his head and shoulders. I grabbed Miellyn round the waist and weran for the rift in the buckling wall.
We shoved through just before the roof caved in and the walls collapsed,and we found ourselves standing on a bare grassy hillside, looking downin shock and horror as below us, section after section of what had beenapparently bare hill and rock caved in and collapsed into dusty rubble.
Miellyn screamed hoarsely. "Run. Run, hurry!"
I didn't understand, but I ran. I ran, my sides aching, blood streamingfrom the forgotten flesh-wound in my side. Miellyn raced beside me andRakhal stumbled along, carrying Rindy.
Then the shock of a great explosion rocked the ground, hurling me downfull length, Miellyn falling on top of me. Rakhal went down on hisknees. Rindy was crying loudly. When I could see straight again, Ilooked down at the hillside.
There was nothing left of Evarin's hideaway or the Mastershrine ofNebran except a great, gaping hole, still oozing smoke and thick blackdust. Miellyn said aloud, dazed, "So _that's_ what he was going to do!"
It fitted the peculiar nonhuman logic of the Toymaker. He'd covered thetraces.
"Destroyed!" Rakhal raged. "All destroyed! The workrooms, the science ofthe Toys, the matter transmitter--the minute we find it, it'sdestroyed!" He beat his fists furiously. "Our one chance to learn--"
"We were lucky to get out alive," said Miellyn quietly. "Where on theplanet are we, I wonder?"
I looked down the hillside, and stared in amazement. Spread out on thehillside below us lay the Kharsa, topped by the white skyscraper of theHQ.
"I'll be damned," I said, "right here. We're home. Rakhal, you can godown and make your peace with the Terrans, and Juli. And you, Miellyn--"Before the others, I could not say what I was thinking, but I put myhand on her shoulder and kept it there. She smiled, shakily, with a hintof her old mischief. "I can't go into the Terran Zone looking like this,can I? Give me that comb again. Rakhal, give me your shirtcloak, myrobes are torn."
"You vain, stupid female, worrying about a thing like that at a timelike this!" Rakhal's look was like murder. I put my comb in her hand,then suddenly saw something in the symbols across her breasts. Beforethis I had seen only the conventionalized and intricate glyph of theToad God. But now--
I reached out and ripped the cloth away.
"Cargill!" she protested angrily, crimsoning, covering her bare breastswith both hands. "Is this the place? And before a child, too!"
I hardly heard. "Look!" I exclaimed. "Rakhal, look at the symbolsembroidered into the glyph of the God! You can read the old nonhumanglyphs. You did it in the city of The Lisse. Miellyn said they were thekey to the transmitters! I'll bet the formula is written out there foranyone to read!
"Anyone, that is, who _can_ read it! I can't, but I'll bet the formulaequations for the transmitters are carved on every Toad God glyph onWolf. Rakhal, it makes sense. There are two ways of hiding something.Either keep it locked away, or hide it right out in plain sight. Whoeverbothers even to _look_ at a conventionalized Toad God? There are so many_billions_ of them...."
He bent his head over the embroideries, and when he looked up his facewas flushed. "I believe--by the chains of Sharra, I believe you have it,Race! It may take years to work out the glyphs, but I'll do it, or dietrying!" His scarred and hideous face looked almost handsome inexultation, and I grinned at him.
"If Juli leaves enough of you, once she finds out how you maneuveredher. Look, Rindy's fallen asleep on the grass there. Poor kid, we'dbetter get her down to her mother."
"Right." Rakhal thrust the precious embroidery into his shirtcloak, thencradled his sleeping daughter in his arms. I watched him with a curiousemotion I could not identify. It seemed to pinpoint some great change,either in Rakhal or myself. It's not difficult to visualize one's sisterwith children, but there was something, some strange incongruity in thesight of Rakhal carrying the little girl, carefully tucking her up in afold of his cloak to keep the sharp breeze off her face.
Miellyn was limping in her thin sandals, and she shivered. I asked,"Cold?"
"No, but--I don't believe Evarin is dead, I'm afraid he got away."
For a minute the thought dimmed the luster of the morning. Then Ishrugged. "He's probably buried in that big hole up there." But I knew Iwould never be sure.
We walked abreast, my arm around the weary, stumbling woman, and Rakhalsaid softly at last, "Like old times."
It wasn't old times, I knew. He would know it too, once his exultationsobered. I had outgrown my love for intrigue, and I had the feeling thiswas Rakhal's last adventure. It was going to take him, as he said, yearsto work out the equations for the transmitter. And I had a feeling myown solid, ordinary desk was going to look good to me in the morning.
But I knew now that I'd never run away from Wolf again. It was my ownbeloved sun that was rising. My sister was waiting for me down below,and I was bringing back her child. My best friend was walking at myside. What more could a man want?
If the memory of dark, poison-berry eyes was to haunt me in nightmares,they did not come into the waking world. I looked at Miellyn, took herslender unmanacled hand in mine, and smiled as we walked through thegates of the city. Now, after all my years on Wolf, I understood thedesire to keep their women under lock and key that was its ancientcustom. I vowed to myself as we went that I should waste no time findinga fetter shop and having forged therein the perfect steel chains thatshould bind my love's wrists to my key forever.