by Jaleta Clegg
The spears wavered. The torches snapped and popped as they burned.
"Heshk Bashnessit," I repeated.
A single Sessimoniss pushed his way forwards. He stared at me, his yellow eyes wide as he searched my face. His gaze moved slowly over me. He blinked once then stepped back. The spears rose again.
"Heshk Bashnessit," I said desperately.
"Whatever you're trying isn't working," Vance whispered.
"Help me," I muttered to the Eggstone. I lifted it in front of my face and breathed on it. The glossy film clouded briefly. I felt the slightest stirring in my head.
"I can't help," Vance said.
"Shut up." All of my concetration was for the tiny pulse of life I'd felt in the Eggstone.
The Sessimoniss stirred impatiently. Their leader, the one who'd looked me over so dismissively, raised his spear and spoke. I dimly understood his order to kill us.
"Wait," I shouted desperately. It came out in the harsh language of the Sessimoniss. I felt the Eggstone's sigh in my head. The memories of their language flooded back. "We came to help."
The leader paused, his spear lowering slowly. "Who are you?"
"The Priestess of the Eggstone." I lifted the Eggstone higher. Their eyes flickered over it. "The sacred blasphemy," I added, giving myself the title they'd bestowed on me the last time I was here.
"You are damaged," the Sessimoniss said, coming to a decision. The spears rose again.
"So was the Eggstone."
They stepped back a pace, the spears lowering fractionally. They hesitated, unsure.
I felt the Eggstone in my mind, a thin trickle of memories. It was nothing like before. The scenes in my mind were dim, washed out and faded. I understood why the Sessimoniss hesitated. They were hard to injure but once injured many did not survive or ever recover. I was obviously not in good shape. Compared to the Sessimoniss experiences, I was as good as dead already.
I moved my hand back, cradling the Eggstone against my chest. It was time to change another of their traditions. Or at least modify it. It was either that or let them kill us.
"I am not of your kind," I said, the words harsh and aching in my throat.
"That is very much apparent," their leader spoke.
"Humans are easily damaged, but we are also easily repaired." I was too tired, too dizzy. I knew what I wanted to say, but the words were hard to find. I needed the Eggstone. It didn't have the energy to help. I struggled through on my own.
"Why should I care?" the leader asked.
"Our ship was shot down. We came to help. I brought the Eggstone back. We are here to find out what happened." I held up the Eggstone and took a step forward.
It was a mistake. My leg gave out. I staggered and would have fallen if Vance hadn't caught me. The spears came back up, aimed straight at our hearts. I leaned on Vance and gave in to despair. We were both going to die. At least it would be quick.
"Hold." A new voice. Another Sessimoniss pushed his way forwards.
I blinked away tears of pain and dizziness, not despair because I wouldn't admit even to myself that was what they were. The Sessimoniss watched me. I stared at his tunic and the slashes of color across it.
"Dresh'Nikterrit of Kishtosnitass," I said as formally as I could. "I give you honor and greetings."
"Not Dresh'Nikterrit," he answered, blinking his yellow eyes. "Koresh'Niktakket of a small and powerless clan."
Not third son, my tired brain informed me, but clan leader. And the Kishtosnitass, once one of the most powerful clans of the Sessimoniss, were almost destroyed.
"What has happened?" I looked at them then, really looked. They were all ragged, their tunics torn and frayed. The Sessimoniss looked thin, hard used. "Why do you hide underground?"
He didn't answer me immediately. He reached with one clawed hand for the Eggstone. His gaze flickered across my face, searching my eyes. He rested his hand on top of the Eggstone. I felt the faint scratch of his claws over my fingers, a thin pulling from the scales on his skin where it touched my hand. I swallowed hard, wondering if he was going to use his poison claw on me. That would definitely be a painful way to slowly die. I'd had a taste of their poison once before. I did my best to keep my hand steady and my fear hidden.
He blinked slowly, a sideways motion of his inner lids that signaled amusement. He lifted his hand from mine and turned to the others.
"It is Heshk Bashnessit," he announced, "come to rescue us and return our god to us again."
They shuffled and murmured. He turned back to me, flicking one glance at Vance before centering his yellow eyes on me.
"Hail the Priestess of Light," he said and bowed, low from the waist, the bow of a clan leader to the priestess of the Eggstone.
The others shuffled as he stayed bowed in front of me. Slowly they followed his lead, bowing to me. Most lowered themselves to the stone floor, their spears clattering against it as they touched foreheads to the ground.
"Hail, Priestess of the Eggstone," they murmured. They weren't very enthusiastic.
The Sessimoniss rose to their feet. The leader blinked down at me. Standing, he was more than two feet taller.
"We must return," he announced. "The people must be informed that deliverance has arrived."
I was in too much pain to wonder about the note of mockery in his voice. Did the Sessimoniss use sarcasm? I couldn't remember. My brain was starting to go fuzzy around the edges. The Eggstone was dormant again.
The spears were raised, the torches moved away as the Sessimoniss began to leave. The Koresh'Niktakket of Kishtosnitass, the one Sessimoniss who supported me before, waited for us. Half of their number waited with him.
I pushed myself away from Vance. I took a step then another, determined my bad leg wasn't going to give out on me. I needed to show them I was still strong, that I wasn't crippled. I made it several steps before I had to stop.
"Vance," I called over my shoulder, as I locked eyes with the Sessimoniss leader, "I need your help. Don't let me fall." I hoped Vance would understand what I asked.
He came up behind me. I grabbed his arm. My fingers dug in as I fought to ignore the pain shooting up my leg. The Koresh'Niktakket watched me, his inner lids sliding open and closed. He turned away and started after the others. I pulled on Vance's arm as I limped after him.
"Whatever happens," I whispered to Vance, "don't let me fall behind."
The Sessimoniss behind us were in motion. The Koresh'Niktakket glanced back at me. He shouted to his warriors. They picked up their pace. I bit my lip and doggedly ignored the pain screaming in my leg and my head as I tried to go faster.
Vance ended up half carrying me. He wasn't doing well either. I hoped we didn't have far to go. If we failed to keep up, I was certain they would kill us without a second thought.
Chapter 8
I stumbled beside Vance. He weaved side to side as he tried to keep up with the Sessimoniss and drag me along. The air filled with a thicker smell of smoke and cooking. And a silence that muffled everything, the silence that only a large group of people standing very still can make.
The rock underfoot was smoother, the loose stones and grit missing. The Sessimoniss turned to one side. We climbed a ramp, winding between fingers of stone that reached to the roof of the cavern. They finally halted at the top, where the ramp flattened out and widened.
I reeled against Vance, trying desperately to keep to my feet. The Koresh'Niktakket wasn't amused this time. He watched me, as coldly as only his race could manage. I tried to stand, to straighten my swollen knee. I reached into my shipsuit and pulled out the Eggstone once again. The Sessimoniss deliberately turned his head to look out into the open space of the cavern. I followed his lead.
The Sessimoniss stood below, mostly warriors, but I glimpsed others hidden among the rocks, dreshtarrit, the low ranking males who did the work that was beneath a warrior, and skitarrit, immature females who also served their clans. I caught a glimpse of several Sessimoniss who could only be their
very young. They were all silent, watching me. Torchlight flickered yellow along stone columns. The cavern was huge, stretching back into darkness. I saw crude shelters of cloth and stone. Somewhere in the distance water dripped slow and quiet, echoing through the rocks.
"The Eggstone has returned," Koresh'Niktakket of Kishtosnitass announced. He raised his arms, his spear brushing against the roof of the cavern. "Behold the Priestess of the Eggstone, Heshk Bashnessit!"
His words echoed. The warriors stirred restlessly. There were no cheers, no welcoming shouts.
I wasn't sure what they expected of me. I took one shaky step away from Vance and raised the dark stone over my head, cradled in both hands.
They stirred again. Koresh'Niktakket of Kishtosnitass watched me, his yellow eyes unreadable. He finally lowered his spear, slamming it against the stone underfoot. It boomed hollowly through the cave.
The warriors below shouted, once, a wordless sound that was both support and challenge. I lowered the Eggstone and turned to the Sessimoniss leader. I clenched my teeth against pain as I bowed to him, the Eggstone still held in front of me. I moved slowly, afraid of falling flat on my face. I managed the bow and straightened.
The Sessimoniss searched my face for a very long moment before he solemnly returned my bow with a warrior's salute.
"We have no rooms for you here," he said at length. We were still the center of attention in the cavern. No one had moved or spoken since that wordless shout. "No altar, no robes of state."
"They are not necessary," I said and hoped I got the pronunciation close enough. I was ready to collapse and the Eggstone wasn't helping me with language.
"Then we offer you our cave," he said and swept his hand to the back of the ledge where we stood.
I nodded. I had to take Vance's arm before I could turn and hobble to the dark hole showing between two pillars of knobby stone. He stuck with me, holding me up without being too obvious.
A skitarrit, wearing a tattered brown robe that only servants of the Eggstone wore, scrambled in ahead of us, a torch clutched in one hand. We followed her in. She stuck the torch in a crude holder made from piled stones and bowed low before scurrying away.
I let go of Vance's arm and slowly sank to sit on the uneven floor. The room was a lumpy bubble of rock maybe ten feet wide and twenty long. The floor rose in bumps and waves. The ceiling was studded with dripping columns of stone. No water flowed in the cavern now, but there was plenty of evidence that it had in the past.
Vance turned to the entrance, rubbing absently at his arm. "Are you going to explain? They've posted guards at the door. To keep us in or to keep others out?"
"Both, most likely." I bent over my sore leg and gingerly felt my knee. It was swollen and painful. The seams in my boots strained over my swollen ankle. My foot was numb. "Don't try leaving. They won't hesitate to kill you."
"Why haven't they killed us already? Everything in your previous report—"
"You read that?" I looked up from my twisted knee to study Vance. In the torchlight he looked different, harder and tired. And older.
"Lowell insisted."
The price I'd paid to get charges dropped against me when I was mixed up with the Sessimoniss before was to submit to a full recall session with the Patrol's psych techs. They drained every bit of information about the Sessimoniss out of me. It was not an experience I wanted to remember.
"They've changed," I said, turning my attention back to my leg. This time I touched my ankle. It was sore, and swollen, but not the shooting pain I expected. I tugged at my boot.
Vance sat near me and reached for my ankle. He rubbed it through my boot. I tried not to wince too noticeably. He worked my boot off. It didn't want to come. My ankle was so swollen it was too tight. He kept working it free. I sighed with relief when it finally slid off. I wriggled toes that were purple with bruises and lack of circulation.
"So, tell me what's changed," Vance said. His dark eyes watched me, his face giving nothing away.
I shrugged. I wasn't sure what was different, beyond the obvious.
"I was trained for this, Dace. Not for wilderness survival, but rather to make contact with them. Except the ship that was supposed to return for me never came back."
"So Lowell sent you off with me instead." I eased back against the rock. I was tired and thirsty and hungry and in pain. I touched the dried blood that still stiffened my hair. My head was tender underneath. I left it alone. "Don't think about making contact on your own," I warned Vance. "They'll kill you."
"You said that before." He was still studying me, I could almost see him cataloguing my faults in his head. "I can speak their language. Not as well as you, but a little. Explain why I shouldn't try to talk to them."
I lifted the Eggstone from my lap. It was still inert, still distant and untouchable. I couldn't even feel the thin tendril of thought that had touched me earlier.
"Go ahead and try," I told Vance. "They barely tolerate me. I don't know what happened, except it was bad. They shouldn't be living in a cave, not like this."
"You knew their leader," Vance prodded.
"He was Dresh'Nikterrit, third son, of one of the six most powerful clans, last time I was here. Now he's Koresh'Niktakket, clan leader, but he no longer has a clan. He's still wearing the tunic of a Dresh'Nikterrit. I didn't recognize anyone from the other six leading clans out there."
"How do you know all that? Explain it to me."
I was saved from saying something rude by the appearance of two raggedly dressed skitarrit. They both wore the brown of the Eggstone's temple servants. They brought a single worn blanket and a crude wooden bowl full of water. They set them down and bowed, touching their heads on the stones before backing out of the room.
"This is as good as it gets," I said as I dipped a handful of water to drink.
Vance looked at the single blanket then back at me.
"We make the best of it," I said. "I doubt they have more to share." The Sessimoniss looked destitute. There were too few possessions for the number of them out in the cave.
"For how long?" Vance asked. He ran a hand through his hair. It wasn't perfectly neat now. It was matted and stuck up strangely in back.
I didn't bother to answer. It was a question I wasn't ready to face yet.
The skitarrit came back carrying a single platter of the pasty grain that was the staple of their diet. There were two small kizzt on the tray. Kizzt were mostly huge eyes with six sets of legs attached to their skinny bodies. Vance poked them after the skitarrit left.
"You eat the eyes," I said.
"I know." He picked one up.
"They aren't bad, once you get used to the crunch." I picked up the other and popped one eye in my mouth. It was food and I was too hungry to be picky.
"I don't think I'm quite that hungry yet," Vance said. "You can have mine."
"Unless things have changed a lot more than I think, they are all mine. They don't even recognize you as a person. They're feeding the priestess of the Eggstone. Other humans don't exist."
"That has changed a bit," Vance said. "They made contact not long after you got back. They worked out a trade agreement."
"Not the ones here on Serrimonia. The rules about outsiders don't apply when they're in their ships, outside of their territory."
He didn't believe me. He was going to do something stupid, like trying to talk to them without me. I sighed and ate a fingerful of the pasty grain. It was bland, but it was hot and it was food.
"Give me a few days to find out what's happened," I said. "Then you can try making contact on your own. And hope they don't just poison you."
He scooped up a fingerful of the grain and popped it in his mouth.
"It's going to take both of us to get back out of here," I said. "Trust me, Vance."
"You think we have a chance?"
"We're still alive," I said, shrugging. "There's always a chance while you still breathe."
We finished the food in silence. He wince
d as I crunched the kizzt legs. I drank more of the water. My leg ached fiercely, my liberated ankle throbbed worse than ever. I was also more tired than I could remember ever being. My head pounded in time with my ankle. I crawled to the blanket and dragged it to the flattest spot in the cave. Vance just watched.
I lay down, pulling the blanket over me. I fell asleep with him still watching me in the flickering torchlight.
I dreamed of cool stone floors and trickling fountains. I dreamed of the skystone altar of the Eggstone. I dreamed the dreams of priestesses gone for a hundred thousand years. I felt the Eggstone in my mind, a distant presence. Its voice was weak, thin as the wind that scoured the far deserts. I heard it whisper in my mind, begging for help for its people. I woke with a promise on my lips.
I was warm. I blinked drowsily at the stone overhead. My leg wasn't aching, yet. I knew as soon as I moved it would let me know how abused it was. My head was clear, for the moment. I watched torchlight dance on the stone while I woke up the rest of the way.
Someone breathed in my ear. I turned my head. Vance lay next to me, the blanket stretched over him. He was deeply asleep, his head turned towards me. I studied his face, relaxed and open in sleep. Who was he really? Why had Lowell sent him with me? And how were we going to get off this planet to report back?
I sighed. I didn't have those answers. I didn't have the information I needed to begin to find them.
I had no idea what time of day or night it was, either. I moved my leg, waiting for pain. It came. I managed to climb out of the blanket and tottered away, looking for a corner that would work as a latrine. The Sessimoniss had already rigged one corner, a small bubble in the rock equipped with sand and a bucket.
I came back into the cave and sat on a ledge of stone, propping my swollen leg in front of me. The other bruises from the crash and our trip across the desert were making themselves felt. I hated the cave, I hated the primitive conditions. Mostly, I hated being stranded. Jasyn was going to worry when I didn't show up on Tebros like I'd promised. I hoped Lowell could keep her and Clark from doing something stupid. They would come to rescue me when I didn't show up, I knew they would. And then they would be shot down. We hadn't had a chance, even in the specially equipped ship Lowell had provided. The Phoenix wouldn't stand a chance either. And then they'd be stranded on Serrimonia with me, if they weren't dead. That was the last thing I wanted to happen.
