The Witches of Karres

by James H. Schmitz

  "You do that, Goth!" the captain said.

  * * *

  Two watches farther along, it became apparent that not everything that could happen on the Venture had happened so far. What occurred wasn't vatch work, though for a moment the captain wasn't so sure. In fact, it was something for which nobody on board had any satisfactory explanation to offer.

  Hulik do Eldel gave the alarm. The captain was on duty when the intercom rang. He switched it on, said, "Yes?"

  "Captain Aron," Hulik told him in an unnaturally composed voice, "I'm locked in my stateroom and need immediate assistance! Knock before you try to enter, and identify yourself, or I'll shoot through the door."

  The captain pressed Goth's buzzer. "Why would you shoot through the door?" he asked.

  "Because," Hulik said, "there's some beast loose on the ship."

  "Beast?" he repeated, startled. Goth's face appeared in her screen, pop-eyed, nodded at him, disappeared.

  "Beast. Creature. Thing! Monster!" Hulik seemed to be speaking through hard clenched teeth. "I saw it. just now. In a passage off the lounge. Be careful on your way here! It's large, probably dangerous."

  "I'll be there at once!" the captain promised.

  "Bring your gun," Hulik told him, still in the flat, dead tone of choked-down hysteria. "Several, if you have them . . . ." She switched off as Goth came trotting out of her cabin, buttoning up her jacket. "Vatch?" the captain asked hurriedly.

  Goth shook her head. "Not a whiff of one around! She couldn't see a vatch anyway, if there was one around." She looked puzzled and interested.

  "Could something else have got on the ship—out of space? Something material?"

  "Don't know," Goth said hesitantly. "Course you hear stories about the Chaladoor like that."

  "The do Eldel's no doubt heard them, too!" commented the captain. He slid his gun into a pocket, felt his nerves tightening up again. "We'll hope it's her imagination! Come on."

  They emerged from the control section, moved along the passage to the lounge, wary and listening. Nothing stirred. The lounge was dim, and the captain flipped the lights up to full strength as they entered. They went down a side passage, turned into another, stopped at a closed stateroom door.

  "Let's stand aside a bit," the captain whispered. "The way she was talking, she might shoot through the door if she's startled!" He rapped cautiously on the panel, pressed the door speaker.

  "Who's there?" Hulik's voice inquired sharply.

  "Captain Aron," announced the captain. "Dani's with me."

  There were two clicks. The door swung open a few inches and Hulik gazed out at them over a small but practical-looking gun. Her delicate face was drawn and pale, and there was a nervous flickering to the dark eyes that made the captain very uneasy. She glanced along the passage, hissed, "Come in! Quickly!" and opened the door wider.

  " . . . I didn't get too good a look at it," she was telling them in the stateroom a few seconds later, still holding the gun. "It was in the passage leading back from the lounge, about thirty feet away and in shadow. A dark shape, moving up the passage towards me." She shivered quickly. "It was an animal of some kind—quite large!"

  "How large?" the captain asked.

  She considered. "The body might have been as big as that of a horse. It seemed lumpy, rounded. It was close to the floor—I had the impression it was crouching! The head—big, round, something like tusks or fangs below it." Hulik's finger lifted, made five quick, stabbing motions in the air. "Eyes!" she said. "Five eyes in a row along the upper part of the head. Rather small, bright yellow."

  * * *

  Everyone—with the exception of Olimy—was gathered in the control section; and except for Goth, all of them carried a gun. Hulik's story couldn't simply be ignored. It was clear she believed she had seen what she'd described. Vezzarn evidently believed it, too. His face was as pale as the do Eldel's. Laes Yango was more skeptical.

  "I've heard tales of ships being boarded by creatures from space in the Chaladoor," he observed. "I have never felt there was reason to give much credence to them. Overwrought nerves can—"

  "My nerves are as good as yours, sir!" Hulik interrupted hotly. "If they weren't, I would hardly have looked for passage through the Chaladoor in the first place. I know what I saw!"

  Yango shrugged, indicated the viewscreens. "We're all aware there are very realistic dangers out there," he said. "Of many kinds. No one can foretell when one or the other of them will be next encountered. Are you proposing that we perhaps leave this child on guard to warn us of whatever may occur, while the rest spend upward of an hour searching every nook of the ship to locate an apparition?"

  Hulik said sharply, "Dani can't remain here by herself, of course! We must all stay together. And, yes, I say we should search the ship immediately, as a group. We must find that creature and either kill it or drive it back into space." She looked at the captain. "For all we know, that unfortunate paralyzed person is in imminent danger at this very moment!"

  The captain hesitated. To leave the control room unguarded for a considerable length of time certainly was not desirable. On the other hand, the Chaladoor looked as open and placid at the moment as one could wish. No stars, dust clouds, planetary bodies, or asteroid flows which might provide ambush points lay along the immediate course stretch ahead; the detectors had remained immobile for hours . . . .

  It shouldn't, he pointed out to the others, take them an hour to conduct a search of the ship which would be adequate for the purpose. There were few hiding places for a creature of the size described by Miss do Eldel. Further, if the thing was aggressive, there was no reason to expect it would remain hidden. He'd turn on the ship's automatic alarm system now which would blast a warning over every intercom speaker on board if suspicious objects came within detector range. They'd keep together, move as a group through each compartment of the ship in turn. That could be done in less than twenty minutes. If they encountered nothing, they'd assume there were no lurking monsters here to be feared.

  "After all," he concluded, "this creature, whatever it was, may have come aboard, looked about, and simply left again shortly after Miss do Eldel saw it . . . ."

  Nobody appeared really satisfied with this solution, but they set off from the control section a few minutes later. The Venture's interior gradually came ablaze with lights as the search party went through the passenger area first, worked on to the back of the ship and the storage, finally checked out the lower deck. But no ungainly beast was flushed to view; nor could they find the slightest traces such a creature might have left, even in the passage where Hulik declared she had seen it. Hulik remained unconvinced.

  "What the rest of you do is your own affair!" she stated. "But I intend to go on no-sleep for the next several ship-days and remain in my stateroom with the door locked. Vezzarn can bring me my meals. If nothing happens in that time, I shall be satisfied the thing is no longer on board. Meanwhile I advise all of you to take what precautions you can . . . ."

  The captain felt Hulik was not being too realistic about the situation. A creature capable of transferring itself through the hull of an armored trader into the interior of the ship presumably would also be capable of transferring itself into any stateroom it selected. Perhaps Hulik simply did not want to admit that to herself. At any rate, no one mentioned the possibility.

  As he sat at the control desk near the end of his next watch, Goth whispered suddenly from behind his shoulder, "Captain!"

  He started. These had been rather unsettling days in one way and another, and he hadn't heard her come up. He half turned. "Yes?"

  "Got any of the intercoms on?" her whisper inquired. She sounded excited about something.

  "No. What do—" He checked abruptly. He'd swung all the way around in the chair to look at her.

  And nobody was standing there.

  "Goth!" he said loudly, startled.

  "Huh?" inquired the voice. It seemed to come out of thin air not three feet from him. "Oh!" A gig
gle. "Forgot! I—hey, watch it!"

  He'd reached out towards the voice without thinking, touched something. Then Goth suddenly stood there, two feet farther away, rubbing her forehead and frowning.

  "Near put out my eye with your thumb!" she announced indignantly.

  "But what . . . since when—"

  "Oh, no-shape! Special kind of shape-change, that's all. just learned it this sleep period so I forgot to switch off when I came in. I was . . . ." She put her hands on her hips. "Captain, I found out where that thing Hulik saw is hiding!"

  "Huh?" The captain came out of the chair, hand darting to the desk drawer where he kept the gun. "It is on the ship?"

  Goth nodded, eyes gleaming. "In Yango's cabin!"

  "Great Patham! Was Yango—"

  "Don't worry about him. He was in there with it just now. Talking to it. I was listening at the door." Goth glanced down at herself, patted her flanks. "No-shape's pretty handy once you get used to not seeing you around anywhere!"

  "Now wait," said the captain helplessly. "Did you just say Yango was talking to the creature?"

  "And it to Yango," Goth nodded. "Snarly sort of thing! No kind of talk I know. Yango knows it, though."

  He stared at her. "Goth, you're sure he has that animal in his stateroom with him?"

  "Well, sure I'm sure! He opened the door a crack once to look out." Goth put her hands out on either side of her. "I was that far from him."

  "That was dangerous! The creature might have caught your scent."

  "No-shape, no-sound, no-scent!" Goth said complacently. "Had them all going, Captain. I wasn't there. Got a look through the door at a bit of the thing. Big, and brown fur. Saw part of a leg, too. Odd sort of leg—"

  "Odd?"

  "Kind of like a bug's leg. Got that shaggy fur all over it, though. Couldn't really see much." She looked at him. "What are we going to do?"

  "If Laes Yango's talking to it, he's got some kind of control over it. We'd better handle this by ourselves and right now, while we know the thing's still in the stateroom."

  "It won't go out by the door for a while," Goth said.

  "Why not?"

  "Doorlock won't turn till we get there. Pulled a bit of steel inside it. So it's stuck."

  "Very good!" When Laes Yango's shipment of hyperelectronic equipment had been brought on board, he'd insisted on having one very large crate of particularly valuable items placed in his stateroom instead of the storage. "Remember that big box he has in there.?" the captain asked.

  Goth looked dubious. "Don't think it's big enough for that thing to climb into!"

  "Something with a body as large as that of a horse's—no, I guess not. It was just a thought." He pocketed the gun. "Let's go find out what it is and what Yango thinks he's doing with it." He looked down at her. "This might get rough. We'll sort of play it by ear."

  Goth nodded, grinned briefly.

  "And I go no-shape, eh"

  "Plus the rest of it," said the captain. "But don't do anything to make Laes Yango think he's arguing with a witch—unless it looks absolutely necessary."

  "Saving that up." Goth nodded.

  "Exactly. We might still have to pull a few real surprises of our own before this trip's over. You'll clear the doorlock as soon as we get there—"

  "Right," said Goth and vanished. He kept his ears cocked for any indication of her presence on the way to Laes Yango's stateroom, but caught nothing. The no sound effect seemed as complete as the visual blankout. As he came quietly up to the door, her fingers gave the side of his hand a quick ghostly squeeze and were gone.

  He stood listening, ear close to the panel. He heard no voice sounds, but there were other faint sounds. Footsteps crossed the stateroom twice from different directions—brisk human footsteps, not some animal tread. Yango was moving about. Then came a moderately heavy thump, a metallic clank. After a few moments, two more thumps. . . . Then everything remained still.

  The captain waited a minute, activated the door speaker.

  He'd expected either a dead silence or some indication of startled, stealthy activity from the stateroom after the buzzer sounded. Instead, Laes Yango's voice inquired calmly, "Yes? Who is it?"

  "Captain Aron," replied the captain. "May I come in, Mr. Yango?"

  "Certainly, sir. . . . One moment, please. I believe the door is locked."

  Footsteps crossed the stateroom again, approaching the door. Yango hadn't sounded in the least like a man who had something to hide. Those thumps? Thoughtfully, the captain moved back a little, slid a hand into his gun pocket, left it there.

  The door swung open, showing enough of the stateroom to make it immediately clear that no large, strange beast stood waiting inside. The trader smiled a small, cold smile at him from beyond the door. "Come in, sir. Come in!"

  The captain went in, drew the door shut behind him. A light was on over a table against the wall on the left; various papers lay about the table. The big packing crate rather crowded the far end of the room, but nothing approaching the bulk of a horse could possibly have been concealed in that. "I trust I'm not disturbing you," the captain said.

  "Not at all, Captain Aron." Laes Yango, nodded at the table, smiled deprecatingly. "Paper work! . . . It seems a businessman never quite catches up with that. What was on your mind, sir?"

  "A matter of ship security," the captain told him, casually drawing the gun from his pocket, holding it pointed at the floor between them. The trader's gaze shifted to the gun, then up to the captain's face. He looked mildly puzzled, perhaps a little startled.

  "Ship security?" he repeated.

  "Yes," said the captain. He lifted the gun muzzle an inch or two. "Would you hand me your gun, Mr. Yango? Carefully, please!"

  The trader stared at him a moment. Then his smile returned. "Ah, well," he said softly. "You have the advantage of me, sir! The gun—of course, if you feel that's necessary!" His hand went slowly under his jacket, slowly brought out a gun, barrel held between thumb and finger, extended it to the captain. "Here you are, sir!"

  The captain placed the gun in his left coat pocket.

  "Thank you," he said. He indicated the packing crate. "You told me, I believe, Mr. Yango, that you had some very valuable and delicate hyperelectronic equipment in that box."

  "That's correct, sir."

  "I see you have it locked," said the captain. "I'll have to take a look inside. Would you unlock it, please?"

  Laes Yango chewed his lip thoughtfully.

  "You insist on that?" he inquired.

  "I'm afraid I do," said the captain.

  "Very well, sir. I know the law—on a risk run any question of ship security overrides all other considerations, at the captain's discretion. I shall open the lock, though not without protest against this invasion of my business privacy."

  "I'm sorry," said the captain. "Open it, please."

  He waited while the trader produced two sizable keys, inserted them in turn into a lock on the case, twisted them back and forth in a practiced series of motions and withdrew them. Then Yango stepped back from the case. Its top section was swinging slowly open, snapped into position, leaving the interior of the case exposed. The captain moved up, half his attention on the trader, until he could glance into it . . . .

  It looked like a big, folded robe made of animal fur—long, coarse brown fur, streaked here and there with black tiger markings. The captain reached cautiously into the case, poked the fur, then grasped the hide through it and lifted. It came up with a kind of heavy, resilient looseness. He let it down again. The whole box might be filled with the stuff.

  "This," he asked Yango, "is valuable hyperelectronic equipment?"

  Yango nodded. "Indeed it is, sir! Indeed, it is! Extremely valuable—almost priceless. Very old and in perfect condition. A disassembled Sheem robot. . . . The great artist who created it died over three hundred years ago."

  "A disassembled Sheem robot," said the captain. "I see. . . . Have you had it assembled recently, Mr. Yango?"r />
  "That is possible," Yango said stiffly.

  The captain took hold of one end of the thick fold of furred material, drew it back—

  The head lay just beneath it, bedded in more brown fur.

  It didn't appear to be a head so much as the flattened-out bristly mask of one. But the eyes looked alive. Hulik do Eldel had described them accurately—a row of five smallish, round eyes of fiery yellow. They stared up out of the case at the ceiling of the stateroom. Near the other end of the head was a wide dark mouth-slit. A double pair of curved black tusks was thrust out at the sides of the mouth. It was a big head—big enough to go with a horse-sized body. And a thoroughly hideous one.

  The captain pulled the folded fur back across it again.

  "The Sheem Spider!" Laes Yango said. "A unique item, Captain Aron. The Sheem Robots were modeled after living animals of various worlds, and the Spider is considered to have been the most perfect creation of them all. This is the last specimen still in existence. You asked whether I had assembled it recently. . . . Yes, I have. It's a most simple process. With your permission—"

  The captain swung the gun up, pointed it at Yango's chest.

  "What are you hiding in your left hand?" he asked.

  "Why, the activating mechanism." Yango frowned puzzledly. "I understood you wished to see it assembled. You see, the Sheem Robots assemble themselves when the signal to do it is registered by them."

  The captain glanced aside into the case. The folded fur in there was shifting, sliding aside, beginning to heave up towards the top of the case.

  "You have," he said, his voice fairly steady, "two seconds to deactivate it again! Then I'll shoot—and not for the shoulder."

  There was the faintest of clicks from Laes Yango's closed left fist. The stirring mass in the case settled slowly back down into it, lay quiet. "It is deactivated, sir!" Yango said, eyeing the gun.

  "Then I'll take that device," the captain told him. "And after you've locked up the case, I'll take the keys. . . . And then perhaps you'll let me know what this Sheem Robot is for, where you're taking it—and why you had it assembled and walking around on this ship without warning anybody about it."