Her sense of humor reasserted itself.
"What do you want to ask me about Elise, Jack?"
Jack looked faintly startled.
"You've changed since your sister died," he said abruptly. "I must admit I expected your strange talents to disappear, but they haven't. In fact, they've increased."
"You'll have to take care, Carrie. They're talking about you in town. We may be civilized, but out here on this frontier world, superstition takes over, often overwhelming science and logic."
Carrie looked down at her hands.
"Sorry," she mumbled.
"Oh, it doesn't bother me. I know there is a rational explanation for what you do, and one day I intend to find it, with your help. Just, for God's sake, don't play your games with the townspeople. You frighten them, and frightened people can be dangerous."
"All right, Jack," she said, looking back up at him. "What is it you want to know?"
"We thought that this link with your sister was mainly telepathic, and only with her, so how come you now seem to be able to pick up other people's thoughts?"
"I could only sense Elise, but she was able to reach one of the guerrillas— a girl called Jo, I think— and send her the information she gathered in Geshader."
"No," she said, forestalling his question, "Jo isn't a telepath as far as I know, she only got vague images from my sister which she interpreted as hunches or intuition. Elise said Jo was never sure what came from her and what she had worked out for herself. If I remember rightly, Jo was the Eureka's linguist."
"I don't know why I could only pick up my twin. Perhaps the link with Elise was so strong that it drowned out everyone else."
* * *
Kusac tuned out their conversation, focusing his attention on the fact that Carrie's sister had been in contact, albeit a very primitive contact, with one of the guerrillas. This could prove to be useful at a later date.
He had to find his crew mates. He knew that before they had left him they had said they were heading for the life pod that they'd tracked down to the forested region not far from Valleytown.
He didn't know how much exposure they'd had to the Valtegans, but it was obvious to him that this was the species for whom his people had been searching. It was even more vital that he reach the rest of his team now that he knew their computer crystal was in Valtegan hands.
His attention was abruptly pulled back to the girl as he felt her need to tell this man of her new link. Icy cold fear washed through him and, with no time for subtlety, he sent a negative command to her.
* * *
Carrie suddenly found herself unable to talk or move. His fear began to resonate along with hers and sheer terror gripped her.
Swiftly he took control, damping her emotions and searching for her short-term memory. He lifted the thought of telling Jack from her mind and backed out, gradually returning control to her.
Confused, Carrie suddenly found herself feeling lightheaded and swayed a little in her seat.
"Are you all right?" Jack asked, reaching forward to steady her.
"Yes. Yes, I'm fine, honestly," she said, rubbing her eyes in an effort to clear her vision.
"I think I've overtaxed you," he said. "We'll leave it at that for today."
The door opened and her father came in. He looked angry and determined.
"Afternoon, Jack," he said, standing in the open doorway. "Carrie, I've just had a visit from David Elliot. Yes, well may you groan," he said tartly. "Unless you accept his proposal, he intends to go to the Town Council to have you allocated to him as his wife. I'll have no daughter of mine go through the indignity of a Council Marriage Hearing. I've assured him you will accept, so get used to the idea that you'll be married within the month." With that, he left.
Carrie sat stunned, unable to think of anything to say.
"David Elliot?" said Jack. "Surely you can find someone younger and better than him."
"Ah, well, you said it yourself, Jack. I frighten everyone else off. I don't exactly have any choice now," she said slowly, picking her coat up. "Will you excuse me? I think I need to go for a long walk."
"Yes, of course," said Jack. "Look, don't go doing anything foolish now."
Carrie flashed him a smile. "Who, me? No, I promise I won't do anything stupid, Jack. You have my word on it."
* * *
"Going out now?" Meg asked as Carrie walked through the kitchen to the door.
"Yes, I'm taking Kusac for a walk," said Carrie, reaching for the latch.
"There's no need to be on the defensive with me, Carrie," Meg replied mildly. "I'm not going to try to stop you. Don't go far from the settlement, though. There are a lot of Valtegans around today." Meg frowned briefly. "Are you sure that jacket's necessary, child? You're going to be boiled alive in this weather."
"Yes," said Carrie firmly, stepping into the yard and waiting for Kusac to follow her. "It may turn chilly later on."
Meg shrugged and turned away to get on with her work.
Carrie pulled the door closed behind her, leaning weakly against it for a moment, trying to control her jangling nerves. Now she had no option but to leave home. The knot in her stomach refused to relax and her throat felt tight with fear. Straightening up, she looked over to where Richard's rucksack lay a few meters distant.
She reached out for Kusac's mind, wishing as she did so that there was something beyond the normal animal thought patterns there. He was the only being, other than her tutor, on whom she dared to try out her increasing new abilities, and on him they did not exactly have a marked effect. Sometimes she could induce him to move in specified directions, but not very often. She hoped that now might be one of those times. If he would only move toward the sacks, she would have a legitimate reason for going over to them in case anyone was watching.
Come on, Kusac, she urged him mentally.
Stiffly, Kusac jerked to his feet, a slightly astonished look on his face. Carrie sighed with relief as he walked over to the rucksack, his movements seeming stilted to her because she knew him so well.
"Good boy!" she murmured, releasing him from her control before she ran over to grab the pack. Clutching it tightly against her chest, she urged Kusac on ahead of her.
As she made her way through the fields toward the river, she realized that she had not yet decided where she was going. There was only one reasonable option open to her; head for the forest and try to join one of the guerrilla bands that roamed there. Perhaps she could meet up with this linguist Jo.
Damn her father, damn David, and damn Meg! Why had they made it impossible for her to stay at home? Any one of them could have helped to make life bearable for her, but instead they treated her like some fragile semi-invalid, cosseting and protecting her from the harsh everyday world until she had almost come to believe they were right. And now she was to be sold off to the only bidder in the cattle market called marriage.
She stopped abruptly, seeing the bridge ahead of her. Once she crossed it, she was on her way out of the valley. To the west, across the slopes of the Plateau Hills, lay the nearest settlement, but another settlement wasn't what she wanted.
Defiantly, she stamped over the bridge and headed north to the forest. The guerrillas were another matter. Whereas her father's underground movement worked passively, cajoling and bribing information out of the Valtegans, the Terran outlaws used aggression as their main tool. They existed in a state of undeclared war with the Valtegans, harassing their off duty troops and the permanent garrison alike, both in and out of the main pleasure cities of Geshader and Tashkerra. Being fighters, they weren't dedicated to perpetuating mankind, just to protecting it. They couldn't afford to be altruistic being so short on numbers. Every able-bodied person, male or female, was expected to fight. Yes, it had to be the guerrillas. Even her father couldn't request that they send her back!
Kusac plodded gamely along beside her. He wasn't finding the going too difficult at the moment, but he suspected it might become worse as time went on.
His hip joint didn't feel as flexible as it should, but that was probably just stiffness as the Terran medic had said. Anyway, he was trying not to favor it.
Now that they were well on their way, he could afford to relax his vigilance a little. He thanked Vartra again that the girl had been too angry to notice his gentle molding of her resolve. Had she not been so distracted, he had his doubts as to whether or not he would have been able to influence her at all. Her mind was becoming so much stronger these days. When she "told" him to go over to the rucksack in the garden, he had instinctively tried to block the order. Against his will, however, he had responded. Of course, she thought him merely an animal not a sentient person and had been totally unsubtle in her command, but it didn't change the fact that it was the first time in his life that anyone had controlled his thoughts or actions.
Could her Talent be greater than his? Only Vartra knew. He sighed, dismissing the thought almost as it formed. That was unimportant, but it did matter that Carrie soon learn the code of ethics that went along with possessing a Talent.
* * *
Dusk was fast approaching when they reached the edge of the forest. Carrie slowed to a stop as she looked at the mass of trees ahead of her. In the half light, their tall dark boles looked somber and menacing. Among them waited many dangers, the least of which was the forest cats. The tales she had heard of creatures in this part of the valley didn't bear remembering. She groaned and, shutting her eyes briefly, gave her head a little shake to dispel the phantoms that seemed to lurch out at her from every dark shadow. She opened her eyes again and found that everything had returned to normal. Kusac and she were alone amid the sea of dark towering trees. Determinedly, she suppressed even these thoughts. A vivid imagination was definitely not an advantage on a trip like this. At least she wasn't alone. With Kusac for company, she should be safe enough, especially from forest cats. Reaching out, she put her hand on his collar and began walking toward the nearest trees.
The ground underfoot was soft and spongy, a carpet of decaying leaves. Soon they would have to stop for the night. Carrie felt in her pockets for the torch she had brought with her. Dragging it out, she switched it on and swept the beam around her, looking for some dry ground on which to camp. The light picked out the trunk of a huge evergreen only a few meters away. Its massive spread of branches had protected the ground about its base from even the worst of the spring rains and when Carrie went over to it, she found the pile of needles surrounding it quite dry.
She shrugged her arms out of the straps of her rucksack and lowered it to the ground. With a sigh of relief, she stretched her shoulders, kneading the sore spots gently with her hands. Although the rucksack had seemed light enough when she left, for the last couple of hours it had felt as if she had been carrying a ton. She was not used to walking any distance either, she thought ruefully, giving her aching calves a good rub before calling Kusac over.
"Food, Kusac. Go and catch food," she said, taking his face between her hands. She tried to project into his mind the picture of one of the rabbitlike creatures that abounded on the planet.
"Hunt," she said, bringing the image of him chasing the creature into her scenario. "Fetch food." She released him, hoping that her earlier success would be repeated.
It was. Kusac had picked up the message loud and clear. Carrie was no longer a pupil; she had learned how to utilize her Talent, and was now beginning to exploit it— and him— to the full.
Kusac moved a few meters away and began to sniff the air near the ground. Picking up a scent easily, he loped off, quite enjoying the opportunity for a little night hunting.
His fears over his leg had proved to be unfounded. The slight stiffness he had experienced was probably due to lack of proper exercise. He was ready now to begin his search for the rest of the scout ship's crew. At least he knew where they would have been heading. The life pod, dropped by the first survey team as a matter of course, had landed somewhere in the swamps ahead of them. That much they had all learned before they had been attacked by the battle cruiser orbiting the planet. His crew mates would definitely make for there if they were still alive.
Aboard the pod was a transmitter capable of sending a message directly to their Mothership. Within a few days, a rescue mission would be on its way. But judging by the lack of activity among the Valtegans, his crew mates had not yet reached the pod and sent the message. This worried him. By the same token, they had not been captured.
The Valtegans' discovery of their computer cube was a bitter blow. Were they able to access its information, they would have a map of not only their search area, but the Sholans' home planet as well. He needed to get that information to Captain Garras as soon as possible.
Tomorrow would settle some of his worries. He would have to tell Carrie who he was before they broke camp, which would be no easy task, but he needed her help to guide him through the swamp. Then, when they found the rest of the crew, she could tell the Captain what message she wanted sent to her home planet. They could do that for the Terrans, if nothing else.
Kusac ducked quickly behind a low bush. In a small clearing ahead of him grazed several of the little rabbit creatures. He tensed, then sprang. A split second later a scream of terror sent the animals rushing for cover. Kusac's mind seemed to explode with the sound.
Help me, Kusac! The cry vibrated inside his skull, catching him in mid-leap and felling him like a stone.
He lay there, stunned for a moment by the force of her call.
Coming, he replied briefly, trying to ignore the buzzing in his head as he got to his feet and began making his way swiftly back to the camp.
What kind of danger? he demanded, tightening his link with her as he sensed her thoughts becoming incoherent with terror.
Valtegans!
He tuned into her mind instantly, seeing her backed against a tree, ringed by four Valtegans.
"How you live?" hissed their officer, taking her face roughly in his hand and turning it. "We kill you. I know."
"Kill again," said another, "but later."
"You killed her," whispered Carrie, her hand going up to catch his wrist. The physical contact let her feel his mind. "And you enjoyed doing it, you bastard!" Her other hand came up in a roundhouse, catching him on the side of the face.
The Valtegan reeled, stunned by the unexpectedness of her blow.
Moments later Kusac erupted into the clearing, his face a snarling mask of fury.
One hand, claws fully extended, lashed out at the nearest Valtegan, raking deep furrows across his chest and flinging him to the other side of the clearing. With a sickening thud, the body caromed off the trunk of a nearby tree to fall in an untidy heap at its base. The others released Carrie, who slid bonelessly to the ground, and began backing away, reaching for their guns.
With a deep-throated growl, Kusac rose to his feet and lunged at the first, hitting him a massive blow on the head. There was a sharp crack and the soldier collapsed.
Pain seared across Kusac's forearm as one of the energy weapons went off. A killing rage took hold of him and, leaping forward, he landed between them.
When reason returned, he stood alone in the center of a devastated clearing. At his feet lay two bodies. Carefully he nudged one with his foot but when he saw the head lolling at an impossible angle, he let it roll back into place.
Leaving Carrie where she had fallen, he checked the other three Valtegans. They were all dead. Good. When he had seen to her, he would drag them off into the forest and bury them somewhere.
His body began to tremble as reaction set in and he sat down hurriedly before his legs gave way beneath him. He had never killed a person before; animals, yes, but neither that nor his training had prepared him for the reality of taking a sentient's life. His anger had helped but, Vartra knew, it had been justified. They had killed Elise and dared to lay their filthy hands on his Leska!
He stopped, taken aback by his use of the term. It happened sometimes among his kind that a male and a female wer
e linked through their Talent by an indissoluble bond, but that this bond could exist between two Alien races was just not possible! They were too different, surely. Yet there must be more similarities between them than he had guessed to make him even think that she was his Leska. No, it was just not possible.
* * *
The smell of hot coffee brought Carrie back to consciousness again. Remembering the Valtegans, she remained perfectly still. Hardly daring to breathe, she opened her eyes fractionally and, peering through her eyelashes, discovered she was lying beside a small camp fire. On the other side, not quite obscured by the flames, sat Kusac.
"Very sensible," he said, reaching for the mug and pouring some coffee into it. "But your caution is not necessary. I have dealt with the soldiers. Come, have some coffee. I've already drunk some and it doesn't taste too bad. It has a pleasantly euphoric effect, in fact."
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