The Sky People

by S. M. Stirling

  The party from Jamestown hung their wet gear from wooden stakes driven into the cave wall's cracks, changed into dry, unrolled their bedding, and prepared to wait out the rain; it rarely fell for more than a day at a time this early in the wet season, even in the hills. The cave was even comfortable if you were used to fieldwork and didn't expect it to warm up like a house. They put heated rocks in their bedrolls to get those toasty for bedtime. Cynthia set out her samples and went on with cataloging and note-taking. Blair talked with the guides and murmured a report on their language into his pocket recorder; the tribesmen saw to the churr. After Marc had built a cage of trimmed branches tied together with tough bark he considered what to do with his greatwolf cub. Now that he'd gone to so much effort and risk to get the cub, turning him loose to starve or be eaten seemed a bit wasteful. And he was too cute to turn into a specimen in Doc Feldman's collection, eyes big with terror and body quivering, whimpering what was probably a continuous cry of: Mom! Come get me, Mom!

  Hasten slowly, Marc thought, and decided to ignore the cub until dinnertime. He might as well get the meal going. Nothing like a long, cold, wet day for an appetite. Probably true of the little beastie as much as it is of us.

  They had a big aluminum pot along with them. Marc filled that with water and set it to boil, along with salt and a couple of meat-extract cubes he crumbled into it. There was a fair bit of antelope left; it was at its best now, since they'd drained it thoroughly when he'd gralloched the kill, but it wouldn't last much longer before it went off and had to be fed to the churr. He cut the meat into bite-sized pieces, dredged them in nurr-flour, browned successive loads in the frying pan along with some garlic, and then tossed it into the water to simmer. Raw breadnuts went into the stew next, as well as dried beans and vegetables from their stores, handfuls of wild greens picked up along the way, and Kartahownian spices that tasted a bit like curry powder and something like sage.

  "Needs a good brown roux and some okra or file," he said, tasting it. "Except for that, not bad."

  For most of the afternoon, the pup cowered in the darkest, rearmost corner of his cage, growling whenever anyone came near, otherwise nothing but a black shadow and occasional glitter of yellow eyes and a whimper of bewildered grief. The preparation of the evening meal brought him forward to stand with his muzzle pressed against the latticework, wrinkling his wet black nose and licking the latticework as he drank in the fascinating novelty of the scent of cooking meat. The savory odors mixed with wet almost-puppy and drying cloth and leather and wood smoke and churr.

  "Take over for a minute?" Marc asked. "Our furry guest probably likes his pretty rare. Damned if I'm going to swallow it and regurgitate it for him, though."

  "Sure, I'll do it," Cynthia said, setting aside a rock. "This isn't going to make any more sense because I stare at it."

  She stirred the stew and threw in a little more salt, then mixed a bowl of flour with baking powder, setting it on a griddle over the fire where it began to rise and bubble, browning. Marc snagged gobbets of meat on a sharp twig, piled them on a bark plate, and waved it around until the food was warm rather than hot; he added some rich marrow from cracked bones. Then he carried it over to the cage, lifted one edge for an instant, and shoved the plate through beneath. The greatwolf cub retreated again, then came forward belly to the ground, growling in a tenor voice. A slight quiver ran through his tail as he sniffed at the warm meat. Then he darted forward despite Marc's looming presence, gripped a chunk, and dashed back to the far corner to bolt it down. Another and another…

  Good thing meat's cheap here, Marc thought, grinning at the supper-dance.

  "Me Grug," Cynthia said from over by the fire, making her voice deep, and pounding a fist on her chest. "Grug mighty hunter. Grug tame dog!"

  Blair surprised Marc by laughing. "Take it young, feed it, and see if that makes it love you—classic domestication."

  "Hey, whatever works," Marc replied mildly.

  Eventually hunger overcame caution, and the pup stopped retreating to eat, standing over the plate and bolting his contents in place. He growled and snapped again when Marc pushed an arm into the cage, but more as a warning not to touch the food than in a serious attempt to harm.

  Still, begin as you mean to go on, Marc thought.

  His hand darted down and took the cub by the ruff at the back of his neck; Marc shook the young beast gently when he tried to turn his head and bite him, and used his other hand to flick the cub's ear—the same methods his mother would have used to discipline him.

  "No!" Marc said firmly, keeping his hold until the cub stopped squirming and trying to bite. Then: "Good boy!" as he released the cub and stepped back.

  The twenty-pound puppy whined and laid his ears back, then returned to eating. When he was finished, his stomach was notably rounder; he pulled the good-smelling bark plate back with him to the blanket in the rear corner of the cage and settled down again, going to sleep with a limp totality, his mouth slightly open and pink tongue-tip showing.

  "Charming," Blair said dryly. "But probably not as practical when it's bigger. And it will be. Very much bigger."

  "People have tamed wolves back on Earth," Cynthia said. "And I think it's cute. I miss dogs."

  Jamestown had cats, but no Terran dogs as yet; they didn't take to zero-G well, and weighed a great deal more. Interplanetary transport made every ounce count, particularly living ounces.

  "People have tamed wolves, my dear," Blair agreed. "However, they're always more dangerous and unpredictable than dogs—and wolves don't grow to be two hundred and fifty pounds, and they can't take a man's leg off with one bite."

  Marc shrugged. That was true enough. Greatwolves weren't just big; their broad wedge-shaped heads gave tremendous areas of attachment for jaw muscles, and they could crack a tharg's thighbones the way a kid did a candy cane. A pack of them could take down a medium-sized 'saur.

  "If it becomes dangerous, we can always shoot it," Marc pointed out. "It's a lot harder to un-kill something than to kill it in the first place. And the species isn't common around Jamestown. It'll be useful for Dr. Feldman's study program."

  "What'll you call it?" Cynthia asked.

  "I think… Nobs," Marc said, and joined her laughter.

  Blair seemed as much puzzled at their amusement as the natives, and a good deal more resentful. Marc was a little surprised. Was there anyone who'd been a kid since the 1960s who didn't know that reference? Surely everyone read Burroughs now?

  "No, actually I'll call him Tahyo."

  "What's that? Some tribal name?"

  "It's Grand Isle for Big Hungry Dog. And he is, him!"

  She was still chuckling as she tasted the stew and pronounced it ready. Everyone ladled one of the molded-leather bowls full, took a chunk of the hot griddle cake, and sat down to eat. Marc nodded at compliments, although the natives were like most primitives and preferred the stronger-flavored organ meats to the muscle cuts the Earthlings liked. The natives sighed after the heart and liver and sweetbreads, and didn't mind hinting that with their wonderful rifles the Terrans could supply an endless series of such treats, leaving the steaks and chops to the churr. They also had a ruthlessly unsporting and practical attitude towards hunting, again much like Earthly primitives; if they were economical with game, it was because hunting was dangerous hard work, not from conservationism. Give them a rifle and a motive, and they'd slaughter anything that moved like berserkers on speed.

  "I'm not going to shoot a five-ton 'saur so you can have kidneys and brains," Marc said with a grin.

  "Why not?" Zhown asked. "Those are the best parts, fried in oil, with crinkletongue spice."

  That didn't keep him from scraping the bottom of a second bowl and belching hugely and politely.

  Venus, Gagarin Continent—Far West

  I'm glad that poor bitch Li is finally dead, Binkis thought. I didn't think anyone could scream so long.

  That had been… how long ago? Since then his leg had healed somewhat,
enough that the knee was merely constant grinding pain rather than agony. He could even move about a bit, on the crutch that A'a had made for him.

  The A'a sound meant something like Old One. Or possibly Wise One. Binkis had tried hard to learn the Wergu language, but that combination of sounds and gestures was more alien than any human language could be, and he'd only had… months… weeks…

  It couldn't have been years, could it? I have lost track. Perhaps I am going mad. That would be best… Now I will go and bathe in the springs.

  Binkis couldn't smell himself much, though he knew he stank; it was lost in the stunning urine-feces-rotting-food-sweat fetor of the Wergu village; one had to call it that, since there were hundreds of them here. He clawed himself upright along the side of the hut. It had been built of rough fieldstone, then plastered smooth on the inside; he didn't think the Wergu had built it, and they'd certainly patched the thatch badly, and let the windows of thin tanned gut rot and rip to tatters. It wasn't even all that uncomfortable, once he'd scraped the worst of the filth out and collected some dried grasses to lie on. The vermin that affected his captors wouldn't bite him, or at least the body lice and fleas wouldn't—the roaches and flies were inescapable. Dozens were swarming around the scraps of his dinner in the gourd bowl by the door, consuming the last of the rancid fish-and-roots stew. A'a had his females feed the captive well and regularly, the same diet he ate himself; they'd also hauled the prisoner to the hot springs and applied poultices of chewed roots to the knee.

  The crutch leaned against the wall by the door and the raw deerhide that covered it. He stuck the padded end under his armpit and brushed the hide aside, blinking a second in the bright sunlight. Outside, the Wergu children played their stalk-and-pounce games, females tended what camp chores there were—they made the crude tools and weapons as well—and a few cripples or older males slowly starved to death.

  Except for A'a. Except for the Old One.

  The Neanderthaloid was carefully field-stripping the AK-47 as Binkis had taught him. His fingers were too large for some of the smaller parts, but he patiently picked up each one and cleaned it again until they all fit. The Lithuanian had known soldiers a lot less careful about it, when he'd been a young conscript. One of A'a's… acolytes, perhaps, at least one of the younger males who hung about him, was watching, enthralled, occasionally making a fascinated hooting sound and slapping himself on the head with a solid thock! sound. Now and then he would submissively groom A'a's bristly hide.

  The Wise One looked up. He finished snapping home the receiver of the assault rifle, clicked in a magazine, and rose, slinging a webbing bandolier full of magazines across his barrel chest. A'a lived in the biggest of the huts now, and the back was stacked with crates of rifles and ammunition. The chief of the band hadn't even objected to moving out to the second-biggest that A'a had used before.

  "Come!" he said/signed to the human; there was a gesture, combined with a grunted imperative that turned it into an order. "Show!"

  "Show what?" Binkis replied fearfully. "Show rifle?"

  A negative; he'd already taught the witch doctor everything he could about firearms, which was why he'd been afraid he'd go into the pot soon. And the word meant explain as much as show. Perhaps show how…

  "Show! Come!" A'a said, and turned to walk away.

  The Wergu led him out of the clutch of huts, past the turnoff to the hot springs, and then uphill towards the caves. After a struggle that brought a sweat of pain to his face, Binkis made an inarticulate sound of protest. A'a shrugged and threw him over a massive shoulder, trotting effortlessly upward; the jolting ride was only slightly less painful than climbing himself. The Wergu was scarcely breathing hard when he set the human down again; even given the lower gravity of Venus, the Neanderthaloids were stronger than any man, beast-strong, gorilla-strong, their great muscles anchored on massively thick bones that gave broader areas of attachment.

  "Cave strange show!" A'a said.

  As far as Binkis could see, it was just a cave; the limestone cliffs around the lake were full of them. He knew better than to disobey the Wise One, though. He waited while the Wergu shaman kindled a torch, and then followed him, his crutch thumping on the sandy floor in rhythm with his wheezing breath. The ceiling swelled out above them, thick with stalactites. Bats rustled up there, and the acrid sweet-sour guano stink of their droppings was thick. After a while A'a stopped and gestured to the walls.

  "Stickmen make," he said.

  Binkis stared, jarred out of his own misery for a moment. The walls were covered by paintings in an eerily naturalistic style, tharg and churr, antelope, saber-tooths, cave-lions, raptors, giant ceratopsians and duckbills and mountainous titanotheres, ochre-brown, green, crimson, blue. The irregular surface of the rock was used to add life to the images, like an endless band of bas-reliefs, and streaks of soot from animal-fat stone lamps rose above the scenes like exclamation points. In places the images had been crossed over with broad splashes of what looked like dried blood, and handprints in the same material. There was a smell of old blood, and of fat and smoke, and cold, wet rock.

  "Strange cave. Come, show!"

  The cave narrowed, until Binkis was stooping over and hobbling painfully. The torch guttered low, but the light seemed to be growing.

  No.

  The captive blinked. It wasn't as if there was actually a light, more as if he was somehow seeing without it. I am mad. Good.

  A'a stopped, raising his torch and squinting as if into absolute blackness. "Show! Show!"

  The poor beast wants me to explain this, Binkis thought with an involuntary giggle as he limped forward into the white not-light.

  The stone vanished beneath his bare feet. What replaced it seemed to be soft and yet firm, like some resilient synthetic, but at the same time there was no sensation of contact beneath his feet at all.

  At last the white light shone through his own body. He lifted his hand, watching bone and tendon move and flex. The pain had vanished in a scent of strawberries, and his fear with the taste of sour cream and springwater. Radiance shone through his skull. A voice louder than God's whispered behind his eyes: Satisfactory.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Encyclopedia Britannica, 16th Edition University of Chicago Press, 1988

  VENUS: History of observation probes: By the early 1960s, orbital observations had confirmed that Venus, like Mars, was a life-bearing world, and further that at least one apparent city existed on the edge of a river delta near the northeastern edge of the continent of Gagarin. Atmospheric probes had given extensive details on composition, but only surface observation could begin to solve the puzzles that had aroused the anxious curiosity of all mankind. Foremost among these was the unmistakable shape of irrigation works, roads, and settlements. Expectations were high that the human race would soon contact its first alien intelligence…

  Venus, Gagarin Continent—near Kartahown

  Early Winter, 1988

  Tahyo wiggled and whined a little, sticking his head out of the saddlebag. Marc dropped his hand to the greatwolf pup's head and gave it a swift, hard rub with the tips of his fingers, the short mottled brown-and-black fur rough under his touch. If you concentrated just behind the crest that ran along the top of the skull…

  The pup sighed and let his head loll back in ecstasy, tongue drooping from the corner of his mouth. The Doc said it was a good bonding mechanism; it was certainly a good way to contain the pup's bounding, chew-the-landscape restlessness. The only drawback was that it made him slobber, too.

  Cynthia, who was riding a little behind Marc, chuckled. "That thing gets bigger every day," she said.

  Marc nodded. Hey, a dog's a great icebreaker. "Weh," he said. "Really sharp growth curve. Doc Feldman's real interested, but I told him no dissection."

  "This climate really is a lot like Spain or Italy," Christopher Blair said from his other side, changing the subject with…

  Dogged determination, Marc thought with a slight smile. He's been
sort of nervous about me since we got back from that trip. And well he should be!

  "You get occasional nice days even in the winter rainy season," the Englishman said.

  "I'd say more like California," Marc replied gravely. "Even though it's as far north as Hudson's Bay."

  Blair shot him a dirty look. Marc returned it with a bland smile and took a deep breath of air scented by the sea that lay in a white-flecked blue expanse to their left. They rode their churr in a loose clump down the eastward track on a day cool but brightly sunlit, with stretches of almost-blue sky between the clouds and haze above. There had been a pathway here before the Terrans came, but it had grown wider—and rougher and more rutted—with the new traffic. They passed a train of ceratopsians pulling massive wooden wagons with six man-tall wheels, coming back to Jamestown with grain and cloth and bulk goods. Marc waved to the drivers, and reflected that they didn't have to worry much. The city-folk had learned not to run screaming at the sight of a 'saur with a human being on it, but they were still in sufficient awe that trouble was unlikely.

  He'd have preferred personally that nobody but contact specialists be allowed into Kartahown, but nobody had come to Venus to be confined to base… and Jamestown was a small town. You could study data in safety back on Earth, if that was your preference—there was only an hour-and-a-bit lag on a video circuit, after all. People came here to do and see things themselves.