The Forerunner Factor

by Andre Norton

  “They—they are caught?” She asked it of him, for in his arms she still was not raised high enough to see the hall below, to know whether she had had some fantastic dream. Once more the balance was swinging—perhaps not so far this time. She could believe it had happened—with another’s power.

  “Look!” He steadied her with gentle care, drew her still higher, her body yet a limp weight, because she had drawn too heavily upon its resources.

  Thus supported, she was able to gaze at what was below. Not darkness—there was a splotch of light within the space not far from the outer door. Irregular in shape it was like a great hearth fire burning. From it streams of light rolled slowly upward. She could see no lines of the net, but through the thin wall of the fire itself she sighted the three who had drawn together, facing the wall they could not broach, prisoners of the united powers they had unloosed here.

  “I will not ask you how,” Thorn said slowly, “or what you did. They are caught. Do you know how long it will hold?”

  “No.” Again that burst of inner knowledge which had led her to this defense was ebbing. It was as if she held a tattered cloak about her, some portions able to give her warmth and covering—rents elsewhere to leave her unprotected. She had been pushed too quickly, too far. There would come a day, of that Simsa was confident, when she could and would command all that had been poured into her through her heritage. But not yet.

  “We must go then, while we can. But are you able?” He still held her, though he had gotten to this feet, drawn her up beside him. She discovered that she was able to stand, that the return of those others complete had renewed her strength in part. There was a place where that renewing might become complete.

  “The pool . . .” she said. “If I can reach the pool—”

  His understanding leaped at once to her meaning. Only the walls, the pit, all which lay between them and that haven . . . She would need his help to go there. Though she had immobilized these hunters below, there were others to come—that she knew. To reach the pool might well be beyond her capability, even with him to aid.

  Need could give one strength, Simsa discovered. Somehow, she made the descent from the balcony, with her companion beside her on the round of the column, setting her hands to the holds, giving her support again and again.

  She was able to stumble along, her stride growing more sure as they left the hall, making a wide circle about those still prisoned. Simsa could see the bubbles of their helmets but not the faces within. Could they be dead? She believed not; their life essence had not withered as the last of their own fire bound them in.

  On, Thorn’s arm around her now and then when she wavered, holding her upright as she paused to gasp, to hold the scepter close to her body. For it seemed to Simsa that out of the rod, came more energy. They were fleeing through the deep twilight now. Night had already brought stars into the heavens.

  They came to the place of the camp. Others had been before them. Boxes were opened, their contents strewn about. The lamp had been melted down. But Thorn still had that light he wore on his belt. He paused long enough to snatch up a bag of provisions—then half carried, half led her on, past the dead—

  The journey across the walls taxed Simsa’s strength near to the end. When they reached that place where they must go down into the deep rock walled chamber, she wilted to the pavement, knowing that she could not descend on her own power.

  Thorn dropped the bag beside her, vanished. She was too dazed now to even ask where he would go and why. Then he came back, a coil of thin, tough vine carried like rope across his shoulder. He pulled and twisted with sharp jerks, for testing its strength. Finally, he knotted the end about her waist.

  “Listen.” He had knelt, was looking into her eyes, his hands on her shoulders to hold her steady so that she could not droop away from him, “I shall lower you. Wait there for me—”

  Simsa thought she smiled, perhaps her lips did twitch in a weak effort at such. There was nothing else she might do but wait. Did he believe she could go running off now into the dark?

  However, she did make some shift to help herself by hand and foot holds among the sides of the descent, although she knew that Thorn was taking the most of her weight on the taut vine.

  Then they were together again, along the passage. When she saw the mists of the pool, a last small surge of strength filled her. She pulled away from him, plunged on into that welcome softness which caressed her as if welcoming arms had been opened wide to gather her in, comfort her body, soothe her mind.

  Here was the silver sand. Simsa fumbled with the catch of the chain about her hips, let her jeweled kilt fall. Still she took the scepter with her as she staggered on, dropping at last into the water, as one might fall in exhaustion upon a waiting bed. Around her, supporting her, was that liquid. She lay upon it, her eyes closed.

  Sounds, clear, piercing sounds. Those struck sharply into the warm quiet which cradled her. She tried to shut them out, to bar them from this place so that she might not have to answer to them. That they summoned her she dimly knew.

  At last she could not deny them. Opening her eyes, Simsa looked up for the second time into the rolling of the mist above the pool. She awakened slowly by degrees, shrinking away somewhat from the shadow of memory—intent on drawing about her only the peace and renewal of this place.

  The sounds—

  She turned her head, unhappy, uneasy anew.

  Near her, their wings outspread upon the water, lying at ease on their backs were the three zorsals. She could no longer wall away memory; had they done what they had been sent to do?

  Chirping, she called to them. Zass paddled with all four feet, after flopping over, came to Simsa, resting her head against the girl’s shoulder, uttering new cries deep in her long throat.

  Shrinkingly, as one might strive to use a limb which had been wounded and might not yet be fully healed, Simsa tried contact by mind with the creature. Again came that twist of alien thought, so difficult to follow. Yet she learned. It was as if she saw through other eyes, or through a distance glass such as Thorn had, but one which distorted in a manner which made her slightly giddy. There below her (at a different angle and in a fashion which accented things she felt her own eyes might not have seen at all) was that field of wrecked spacers. Things moved there even thought it was half in the shadow. Then there arose a rounded dome of what must have been of the ships. That grew closer and closer, a hole in it larger as she so approached. Within the hole—a broad beam of some kind immediately below. Out again, fast, fast, into the night—free, free to fly, to be in the air. Joy which was like a shout of triumph. Free to fly, free, free!

  Zass’s joy at her healing, her being once more able to live in her own element. But that ship, the beam within—surely they had meant that the zorsals had planted the signal—the signal which might or might not be answered.

  Simsa lifted her head. Her dreamy content fled, awareness that they had in no way resolved this venture, crowded in.

  No, he had not left her this time. He had been also in the pool. His body, so white against the silver of the sand, was bare of clothing. His head rested on his arm, was turned away. She thought that he must be asleep.

  Reluctantly, she drew herself back up on the sand. There, coiled in a small shining heap was the girdle of Simsa. The girl reached for it, the links tinkling musically against one another with a small sound of bell notes. She had laid the scepter across one knee as she locked the chain once more in place, moving slowly because her body’s awakening did not seem to keep pace with that of her mind. She felt physically languorous, unwilling to set her hand to anything.

  Zass had followed her out of the pool, now squatted down at her side one small forepaw cool against the skin of the girl’s thigh as the zorsal looked into her face. Simsa sensed a need for praise, for reassurance that all had been done well. She caught Zass up, held her closely, crooning, rubbed the small head behind the half unrolled antennae. The big eyes were near shut as Zass gu
rgled in vast contentment.

  “They are back.”

  Simsa was startled, looked around. Thorn had rolled over. His head was now chin supported on arms he had folded before him.

  “Yes, they are back, and I think that they have done this—” Simsa reported which she had learned from Zass’s erratically contacted mind.

  Then she had a question of her own: “If the signal has been planted and its message goes forth, when will your ship come? In time?”

  “Let us hope so.” The serenity which had been on his face when she had looked at him first was replaced by a frown. “But it is as fortune sends.”

  As fortune sends. The old, old words of the Burrowers by which she had always lived. One could give fortune a nudge now and then as they had tried to do. It remained to be seen how well. While—what did they themselves now face?

  He was gazing at her as if she now were as alien to him as the zorsals’ minds had been to her.

  “What did you do, back there?”

  What was the truth? That she did not know. She had wrought with tools she did not understand, to produce something which she could not explain. Still she must make him some answer. There would be many such demands upon her now, she knew—and what answers?

  Slowly, fingering the scepter, looking more often at it than at him. (Why? Because she was suddenly so lonely, knowing that nowhere, even among the far stars now, would she find one who could understand what she saw?) Simsa told him of that strange birth of her other selves, of how they did, not what she had ordered, but what they themselves found necessary for her continued safe existence.

  When she had finished, there was silence and that silence lengthened. At first, she had not wanted to look at him and see, perhaps, a shadow of disbelief on his face. Then, because of this continued quiet, she did not want to view what was worse—the agreement that she was alien, past contact with those of this age and time.

  At last, refusing to surrender to the fact that she might be that indeed, that she was to be likened to one of the stone people of this city come to life, she made herself raise her eyes.

  There was wonder in his expression. No—she wanted none of that from anyone, especially him. He had his mysteries brought from the stars, things which would make any of Kuxortal look upon him as greater than life. Was what she did any different in its way? There had been a people once who had mastered other forms of existence, who did not have boxes, and rod weapons, and ships, but held within themselves their own kind of knowledge to build in another way. It was how one used one’s inner strengths and how one lived which must be the test of one’s knowledge.

  Once more, she began to speak, not slowly now, because she did not have to seek for words to describe things which were strange and dangerous, and very new to her also. No, this was in a way a plea. She who had never allowed herself to ask, even of Ferwar, what she wanted most—to find another who would be close enough to care where one walked, how one fared in the world.

  “You have your nullifiers,” she found her tone sharp, challenging, but she did not abate that note—let him believe indeed that she was questioning his way of life against this of her own—“all those death dealers out there!” She pointed to the mist still swirling hypnotically about them.

  “You have also spoken of ‘talents,’ of minds which can meet minds, of other wonders. There are many worlds, many peoples, are there not? Both young and old. All have their triumphs and their failures. I do not know why I was born able to take that from what was stored here this knowledge. I do well believe that this may come to be a very heavy burden, one I would willingly pass on to others, if I could. But can you give your hands, your brain, that which is the very essence of you to anyone else?

  “There are mysteries past solving. Is that not so? Did you not speak of how bits and pieces of those mysteries are carefully garnered and stored, studied? Did you not tell me of a race which is very old by your toll of seasons, which is also the guardian, the interpreter, of what can so be learned?

  “Your brother came here seeking answers. He found puzzles. Some of them were only planted in greed and hate and were of your own time and the devising of your kind. But also he found Simsa.

  “And because of that—I am. In Kuxortal, I was one who was like an unripened seed which would never have borne fruit. But chance, and you, brought me here. I found my soil, I was planted. I am now what that fortune which men seek, and sometimes fear very much, has made.

  “I do not know yet what I can do. Great fear back in that hall forced me into action which was not planned by my mind. It may be that intentions and will and knowledge can live for ages upon ages—be given freely to one who is open to them. I only know that I am not she who you found in Kuxortal. Nor am I wholly she who resigned herself to waiting here. I am more than one, less than the other, but I am a person who is real and truly of herself. Though I am not sure as yet what I may be.

  “You are of the stars. You have seen many worlds. I know that the race of Simsa was once also of the stars. Though of those I have been left few memories. She remained here. Again I do not know why. Perhaps her starship could fly no more, perhaps she grew tired of much traveling and wanted only peace. I,” she lifted her hands, smoothed back her damp hair, “have only scattered memories and it distresses me—no, it is really painful to draw them back. I want no other life, only that which is now before me.”

  Then she smiled, a little sadly and added:

  “If indeed we have any long life ahead of us. For if your ship does not come and these who burrow here, even as those other scavengers in the holes of Kuxortal, have their way, I do not see much ahead of us now.”

  He sat up straightly, tossed back that black hair which had grown since he had come planetside. There was no longer that awe—if it had been awe which she had shrunk from recognizing—in his face. She could see his chest arch as he drew a deep breath.

  “I do not know either, my lady, who or what you may be. But that you are a wonder for which many men have sought for a long time and never hoped to find. That is plain. We have hunted the Forerunners ever since our first ship landed to view ruins which were strange and empty. They are legends—so old, that even before my race ventured into space there were tales on Arth of earlier visits from aliens who traveled from far stars. That symbol—” he pointed to the horns and ball, “is known to us. We had priestesses in our own dim, long past history who wore such in honor of a goddess who was many things—dear companion to men, tender of the growing food, cherisher of children—and ready in her wrath to strike down those who threatened all such. Perhaps there was a Simsa there once. She was remembered for lone: and long.

  “But here you have accepted from the past what we have longed to know.”

  Simsa shook her head. “No, I shall not be another treasure for your people to hold. I am alive, a person, not an ancient carving, a handful of jewels set into some alien pattern.”

  She pointed to the cuff still about his forearm. Though he had shed all else of his clothing to bathe in the pool, still that was snugly fitted to him.

  “Why did you not take that off?” she asked. “Do you expect still another attack?”

  He glanced down as if a little surprised that he still wore it. Then his fingers fumbled, he turned it about and about, but the band would not slide from his forearm. It was not tight enough to pinch the flesh, neither would the cuff give enough for him to rid himself of it, in spite of his efforts, which she watched quietly until she said:

  “It would seem that you, too, will carry a portion of the past with you. What will you do when you reach your home place? Cut off your hand that your kind may have what you wear to puzzle over? A lost hand, a lost freedom, neither will serve us. I shall perhaps talk to your seekers of learning, in my own time and place—if we ever leave this world. But I am to be no prisoner of theirs because they think me some ‘treasure’!”

  “They will not.” He said that quietly, but in his eyes there was a stronger promis
e. How well he might keep that promise she could not tell. That, like all else, must be answered by time itself.

  Suddenly, she laughed. “We speak as two who have the good will of fortune, we who are not even sure we shall be alive with tomorrow’s sun.”

  He did not look dismayed. Instead, he stretched wide his arms, as one who awakens from a refreshing sleep to face the brightest of good days on a morning at the first of the dry-season.

  “I shall swear by fortune, Lady Simsa, who is herself and no other, that is what I believe. We shall live—and we shall seek the stars in freedom.”

  Now Simsa again smiled in return. She also nursed a promising lightness of spirit. Perhaps it was the influence of the pool’s renewing, perhaps it was something else—his promise? Or maybe—she shied away from following that thought any farther now. She must learn herself before she strove to teach others, especially this man from the stars to which Simsa would return. Yes! That she too believed now, even as she believed in the realness of the sand about her, the shining of the pool, the heaviness of the ring about her thumb—that a new day would come tomorrow!

  THE END

  FORERUNNER:

  THE SECOND VENTURE

  1

  This was scraped land, laid bare to heat-roasted rock, lacking a single lift of withered leaf or stem to break the unending stretch of gray-blue stone seamed with darker cracks. Still a cloak-covered body crouched above a winding fissure, one that ran from horizon to horizon across the desert world. Only in that fissure itself was there movement, a thick, ever-forward lapping—not of liquid, but rather heaving sand, swirling slowly along.

  There was no sun to beat and blast this wasteland, nothing but open sky overhead. Open until the eyes reached above far enough to mark that screen of haze lidding this simmering pot of a planet.

  The cloak shifted a fraction. Within the cave made of its folds there was small movement. The soft touch of tight curled antennae, the sharp prick of a claw against pillar of arm.