It was one of the robed Deves who came up to the Zacathan now.
"Only the mad walk the Shattered Land." His shrill voice formed words via the translator. "Why do you urge death on us—take it upon yourself?"
Zurzal waved his hand toward the wall of the flow. "Climb and see. There are islands in the flow—it is not all as you see it before you here."
For a moment it looked as if the Deve would do just that—climb to see for himself. But then he wheeled quickly and swung up on the mount his fellow, already on his own beast, had herded toward him.
Without any other answer the two started away. The knot of Skrem broke apart and scrambled toward their own beasts, as if fearing the creatures might follow the two which the Deves bestrode. Their chittering reached the height of screams as they swung up to follow the runaways.
"That," commented Zurzal after a moment, "seems to be that. At least we still have the supplies."
Jofre wondered what good the small amount they had brought with them would do if they were left without transportation. On the other hand it might well be that I'On and his fellows would catch the Deves and return. There was no way they, the three of them, could aid or hinder that chase at present. And he fell to checking over the woven containers which held all the equipment they had been able to assemble.
They made up three packs of the main essentials. Zurzal had used a knife and cut from his suit the half-empty sleeve covering his regrowing left arm. It was in length now a little past the elbow of his right one and the fingers of the hand on that side, when he flexed them, seemed to be as ready for work as those of his right. It was that miniature left hand which steadied the scanner in its web carrier.
Jofre had taken as much of the foodstuff and concentrates as he could crowd in his pack and knew he could shoulder. And Taynad worked with him putting together a burden of her own. His last addition was a roll of sleep coverings which he knotted into a rope, the other end of which he could tie to his weapons belt and carry up with him.
The Jat jumped to the side of the Zacathan as they began their climb—there had been no sign nor sound of the return of their fellow travelers. And it was Yan who had a ready paw to steady the scanner and aid the heavily laden Zurzal to make the top.
Once there Jofre jerked up the bundle of coverings and they all three set to work slitting them into strips and binding them thickly, not only around their own feet but around those of the Jat also, for with their other burdens they could not hope to carry Yan across that strip of lava flow ready and waiting to saw to pieces any flesh unaware enough to trust foot to it.
It was taking them a long time; the sun was well along towards setting. Jofre wanted to make that rock point which offered all the safety they could hope for before darkness closed in. Moonlight—under the two moons of Lochan, which whirled in orbit around each other as they passed— would not be enough to lighten all the pitfalls.
They selected what they believed was the narrowest of that anciently frozen flow and started their wavering path, for they could not keep to a straight line across it. As it was, the extra covering shredded from their feet, and they had to keep their pace to a crawl.
But there comes an end to every trial, Jofre thought thankfully, when at last he could put out a hand and touch the rock of the spur the flow had not engulfed. Again they must climb, first squatting to loose the tattered coverings from their feet and making sure that their packs were roped well together to be lifted once they had reached the top.
The Jat took the lead, again flapping its large ears and uttering cries as if it recognized the place, something of its exuberance urging them on. Then they were safely aloft and looking out into a stretch of country where the Shattered Land was not what it had been called.
They had reached a height and that widened out into a vast plateau where the fury of the mountain fire had not left any such scars as it had below. To the north, a little aslant of what might be the center of this open stretch of rock, gravelly sand, and a few stubborn patches of the yellow tundra grass, was a hill, the crown of which had been flattened off except for some humps here and there. It had a different look to it than the other heights around—as if it had not come directly from the shaping of nature by wind and time.
The sound of the Zacathan's trail guide was now a steady drone and he headed out towards that hillock with the certain stride of someone knowing exactly where he was going. Nor had they been led astray, for, as they neared the truncated cone, they saw that the tundra grass had withered patches, that there were small heaps of the turf which had been peeled back so that the ground below could be trenched and trenched it had been, in narrow ditches. These no longer stood out clearly, for it was plain that they had been exposed to the weather for some time, but Jofre recognized the site as it had appeared on one dim tape. This was the doomed camp of the expedition which had made the first discovery.
It was only seconds later that they were fully shown what had happened. There were a series of rocks placed in a half circle about the edges of those ditches and mounted on each rough base formed by one of those was a skull. And they seemed to grin with a ghastly promise as the off-worlders drew near.
There were no other signs of any visitors—no remains of any camp structure if there had been such. Nor, as Jofre discovered as he circled the eerie site, any other signs of other bones. But not far beyond the ditches with their ghostly guardians there was a sinking of the plain which occurred abruptly and could not be sighted until one was almost on it.
Where the rest of the plateau stretching so far about them suggested a desert country, this slash in the rock allowed them to gaze down into a narrow file as different from the land above as one planet might differ from another.
There was a thick growth of fleshy-leaved plants, large near their first rooting at the foot of the rise, dwindling in size as they climbed. The leaves each grew in a rosette which was centered by a thick red stem—the leaves being a sickly yellow-green. And on the stem was a trumpet-shaped growth which might be a bloom yet certainly gave no pleasure to the eye.
What was more important was that these plant beds bordered a stream of dark water—at least it seemed to flow like water, if a little sluggishly. Though, Jofre decided, they would hold off testing it as long as possible. There was something about this dank seam in the earth which repelled.
Dusk would soon be upon them and they must establish some type of camp. The threat of the skulls was ominous enough to make them sure they should select a site which they could defend—against what—or whom—they could not be sure.
They found the best cover the countryside had to offer farther on towards the cone hill where there were small bumps in the ground and Jofre, with a scout's trained eye, picked out three such which could form a rough triangle, their pack gear and stones dragged up to give some seeming of walls, low as those had to be.
Even Yan helped with the dragging of stones, and pawed up sods of the tundra grass to plaster between the loose rocks. They worked as fast as they could, though they tried to make certain they did not scant any loophole. A small fire, set in a hollow scooped in their rude fortress, could not be sighted across the plain top—though it would be visible from the hillock but to that he had no answer.
However, the night winds were chill enough that they must have a measure of heat. To keep that cup of flame alive during the night would be one of the duties of the sentry. And they carried to pile against one of their shelter rocks dried vines which crisscrossed the tundra growth and were thick enough to be broken into respectable sticks.
Once more they ate their limited rations slowly. Zurzal sat with the scanner between his outstretched legs, his good hand more occupied with examining that than by conveying the ration strips to his mouth. Jofre chewed as he squatted by another of their chosen boulders, staring out across that ill-omened stretch of trenches and the guardian skulls, back across the country they had come.
If the Skrem and the Deves, he thought with a resi
gned logic, really wanted to be rid of them, all they need do was to leave them marooned here. There was no way he could see that they would ever be able to make a return journey. Twice he was nearly moved to say that aloud but then decided that his own dire predictions must indeed be shared by all of them since they possessed the intelligence of sentinent beings—even the Jat must feel that they must have indeed come to the end of the trail.
Still you had the perkiness of one at home with the surroundings. Earlier it had surveyed the skulls round-eyed and Jofre had been able to pick up a glimmer of disgust from the creature's mind. But there was no shadow of fear.
"Tomorrow"—Zurzal gave the scanner a final pat as if it were a pet animal ready to offer good service—"we need wait no longer. Tomorrow!" There was exultation in his voice and his frill waved and stiffened, dark color flooding up through its ribbing.
Neither Jofre nor Taynad made answer. They were concerned with more than just tomorrow—the time which stretched beyond that. It might serve Zurzal completely that he prove for all time his contention was right—the ancient and unknown past might be made clear, recorded for the reading of others—but they were still engaged in living and preparing to continue that state.
Jofre took first watch. The Zacathan did not seem prepared to either settle down to rest or put himself to camp routine. He had edged out into the night as Jofre crouched tensely trying to follow his movements, as well as pick up any threat which might lie hid. Back and forth along those trenches Zurzal had strode, the com in his hand, until at last he seemed to find some point he had been hunting and stood there for some time.
There was something about that hillock which was now a backdrop for their own camp which kept nudging at Jofre. He had absorbed enough of the time scanted instructions the Zacathan had given on Wayright and during their flight to Lochan to believe that that rise might indeed hide ruins,
part of a city or a single fortress. Yet those who had come here had not delved there but rather dug their trenches at its foot.
It was a place which could be defended—against anything but an air attack. Between quick glances at the Zacathan to make sure that he was safe, the guard began to set himself the problem of how that rise might be made to serve them best should those who collected skulls come to see what stirred here now.
Zurzal had returned when Jofre reached over to touch Taynad's shoulder, signal her for second guard duty. The double moons gave strange light to this barren country— it was wholly alien and more to be mistrusted for that.
"There is a watcher," she whispered. "Yan knows. See."
Her gritty fingers touched the back of the hand Jofre had reached to awaken her. And he did understand. The sending was very dim, but it was there. They were indeed under observation.
"Yan will know," she said. "Rest while you can."
Mistrust rippled in his mind and he repelled it. With her promise to the Zacathan she meant no ill, nor would she deliver any attack until she formally ended that courtesy tie. He could rely that she and the Jat would do just as he had been doing—stand guard.
So they won through to day again. Taynad reported that the watcher had withdrawn sometime in the early predawn and that the Jat had shown no fear concerning it.
They had to insist that Zurzal eat—he was as a child before a feast day—so eager to be at what he would do that nothing else mattered. With Jofre's help the scanner was once more mounted and then there was a tedious space of waiting as the Zacathan applied measurements and adjustments, making sure that the instrument aimed directly down, not across the central one of those ditches.
THEY WERE NOT PREPARED FOR WHAT CAME WITH less warning than a mountain storm. The sound tore through the brazen sky, something totally foreign to this place which had so been forgotten by time.
A shadow swept over the plateaus like a giant Kag preparing to dive on prey—though that airborne craft did not indeed skim as close to them as the sound suggested.
Jofre had thrown himself flat, taking Zurzal down with him, half covering the Zacathan's body with his own. He was prepared in one instant of recognition to feel the sear of laser fire catching them both.
But the flitter's occupants had not taken their advantage and the aircraft swept on, over the hump of the cone— northward. They had been such easy prey that Jofre could not believe for an instant or two that they seemed to have been ignored.
It was a screaming cry from the Jat which brought him up to his knees, half-slewed around. Yan was pulling at Taynad, striving to drag her from where she had prudently gone prone at the passing of the flitter, toward them. Why became understandable almost immediately.
The edge of that cut which bisected the plateau suddenly had developed a series of humps along its edge, moving things which flowed up and over as if they were part of some giant flood imprisoned below and determined now to be free.
Sword-knife in one hand, the barbed length of chain in the other, Jofre tried to settle his weight evenly, be prepared to meet that dash. The Zacathan had drawn his stunner but against this wave that would be little good. Taynad moved in, the Jat leaping up and down at her side and screaming. It stooped to scrabble up an armload of stones, nursing those against its small body as potential weapons.
The creatures from the chasm resembled Skrem—but of a different kind than those who had companied with them earlier. These were larger; they did not ride but scuttled at a speed which hardly seemed possible toward the beleaguered off-worlders.
The Zacathan's weapon hissed and the first line of the charge twisted and went down, frozen in the cords of stass. However, that was only a portion of those arranged against them.
Jofre's eyes narrowed, he measured distances, the footing before him, and then with the ear-splitting, heart-stopping cry of the issha, he went into action, meeting the first three of those who had tramped over their kind with the whirling hooked chain. One of those hooks caught under the edge of the helmetlike head covering of the foremost, and the force of the swing whirled the native off his feet, smashing him into his closest fellow.
Jofre was back in a crouch. The tip of his knife had caught the third at the point where a human would have had a chin and sent it down as cleanly as the chain had taken the others.
A rock flew past Jofre to strike another Skrem flat on the head so it staggered and fell. Then another and another such projectile flew with skillful aim. It was not only Yan who was the marksman. Taynad had joined him, proving herself an expert with even such crude weapons. Still they came.
Zurzal had had time to thumb another charge into his hand weapon and this he now discharged, adding to the line of motionless bodies.
The Skrem had made no sound when they attacked; only Jofre's cry had broken the silence. Now they could hear again the beat of the flitter engine. Jofre's shoulders stiffened. They had them at their mercy, those in the flitter, for he was very sure that the crew of that was not coming to their rescue.
Yet, it would seem that he had been wrong. The Skrem milled around on the edge of the cut, now forming another attack line. Yan was screaming again, jumping up, trying to catch at the Zacathan's maimed arm, draw his attention. Zurzal attempted to fend off the Jat and still keep his weapon poised.
Once more the flitter banked, withdrew towards the hillock, and the wild Skrem gathered. How many charges they could hold off Jofre dared not try to guess. He believed he did know what those in the flitter had in mind—the wearing down, even the death of him and his companions, whereupon they could move in and take what they wanted. Yet surely those aloft must have superior arms on board—why this cat-and-mouse play with them and the wild Skrem? Except perhaps that they needed Zurzal to operate the machine and so were willing to keep their attackers at bay for now lest they destroy the scanner.
The Jat turned away from Zurzal and threw itself at the scanner while Zacathan, with a hissing cry, his neck frill an engorged crimson, clutched vainly after him. But the maneuver of the Jat brought the Zacathan's hand down on th
e controls.
There was a sound which drowned out the flitter. Jofre saw that machine tremble in the air, dip sidewise, as if its equilibrium was disturbed. Color, sound burst from behind. Jofre, by the very weight of that blow on his ears, was pushed against one of the rocks which had been part of their shelter for the night. It took some seconds for his eyes to adjust to the flow of images, so merged one with the other that it was difficult to see any one clearly. There appeared to be beings mounted and riding. Someone dressed not unlike the Axe was haranguing a mob of people into which the mounted warriors flowed and comingled—then the whole scene began to flicker at the edges—
Jofre was half knocked from his place by the thud of a small body against him. He threw out an arm to fend the Jat off, still so bemused by that swirl of pictures before him that he did not defend himself fully against that scrabbling paw.
Yan was gone, swallowed up by the play of pictures in the air fanning out farther and farther from the center point of the cone hill which was no longer that, but a great, towered keep more imposing than the largest of the Lairs.
The—the stone—the stone was gone! Jofre stumbled away from the rock support. Yan had taken his stone. Then—
There was no more change, weaving, misting about what he was watching. Instead it steadied into a clear stretch of a different world. The mounted warriors charged the crowd gathered around the priest. People who resembled the maned natives of the present produced weapons from beneath their robes, cut at the mounts, dragged riders like the Skrem from their beasts.
It was so real! Jofre edged closer to the rock and felt a body beside him. Taynad's breath came fast against his cheek. Forgotten was the attack from the chasm beasts. There was certainly no flitter in the air over this battle which they watched rage back and forth across a city so long lost that there was not even a dim memory of it left.
From the towered citadel issued more troops—these on foot. They were real, three-dimensional. Jofre could see them as well as if he had been there on the day when all this had happened.
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