The Cyborg and the Sorcerers

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  As he came within range, Slant raised his pistol and fired, still running. The single shot hit the dragon squarely in the head.

  That distracted it from Ahnao but did little else; either the bullet had failed to penetrate the skull or it was too small to do any significant damage once it had penetrated. A small dribble of blood appeared, but that did not seem to inconvenience the monster as it glanced up again at this new annoyance. Except for its head, it did not move; Ahnao did not move at all.

  Slant was only a few meters away now; he took aim and emptied the rest of the clip across the dragon's head and chest, in a diagonal from the right eye to where he estimated the heart to be.

  The monster did not ignore that; it screamed, more like a bird of prey than any cat, and rose from its crouch as blood seeped from a dozen wounds. Ahnao was carelessly kicked aside as it charged toward its attacker.

  The instant it became clear that the thing was attacking him, Slant slipped easily into his warrior self. He watched calmly as the monster came at him, and at the optimum moment he dove sideways out of its path.

  It whirled with incredible speed, froze for an instant, and prepared to pounce. Slant got a good clear look at its thick, short legs and long, heavy body, and the blood streaking its hide and dripping from the neat dotted line across its face and chest. One bullet had damaged an eye but not ruined it; it could apparently see as well as ever, though the injury must have stung. Other bullets had torn into its muzzle, its lower jaw, and its chest; none had touched its neck. The neck might prove a vulnerable spot, then, Slant told himself.

  He rolled out of the path of its second lunge, easily avoiding it by watching the tension in its leg muscles, so that he began moving at the same instant it did. It was obvious by now that the machine-pistol was not the optimal weapon against the creature, even had he cared to take the time to reload; he thrust the gun into its pocket and reached for his snark.

  It wasn't there.

  He had dropped it, probably during that mad gallop. His best weapon was gone. The dragon was turning, lashing its tail, preparing for another lunge; he did not have time to reload the machine-pistol. He found the hand laser, still securely in its place, and drew that instead.

  The creature did behave like a cat in several ways, but it did not move like a cat; it was not quick and graceful, but slow and lumbering for the most part, though it showed occasional flashes of surprising speed, particularly in stopping and turning. Its charges were more reminiscent of a rhino or an elephant than of a cat's pounce; the short, thick legs it needed to support its great weight made that inevitable.

  The third attack came, and he dove aside again. He had no desire to keep this up for very long, however, as he had no idea whether the monster would tire before he did. Rather than stop and wait for the next attack, he kept moving and leaped for a low-hanging limb of a nearby maple tree. A thing of that size and bulk could not possibly climb or jump well in a gravity so close to that of Old Earth.

  He had chosen the maple from the several trees within reach because it looked sturdy and easy to climb. In general, he recalled from both basic training and a chance fragment of childhood memory, maples were good climbing trees once you got started.

  This one was no exception; he made his way upward easily, clambering from branch to branch, until he was about ten meters off the ground. The monster had located him again and watched his ascent.

  A cat, Slant knew, would sit back on its haunches and consider the situation; he watched with satisfaction as the monster sank to the ground and stared contemplatively up at him. It was not designed for sitting, its legs were far too short in proportion to its body; it measured perhaps two meters from shoulder to paw, and at least eight meters from shoulder to tail.

  It settled itself comfortably and tried to wash its wounds between wary glances at its treed quarry; the washing was not a success, as its stubby paws could not reach far enough. Still, it went through the instinctive motions.

  Slant used this brief respite to reload his gun, check over the laser, and study the situation below. Ahnao lay unmoving at the roadside thirty meters away; that accidental blow of the dragon's paw must have knocked her unconscious, Slant thought, or at least dazed her badly. More than a hundred meters in the opposite direction his horses were milling about uncertainly, but the dragon paid them no attention; probably they were too far away to interest it. The creature itself was directly beneath him, waiting for him to come down.

  Halfway between the tree and his horses he saw sunlight glinting on metal; that was undoubtedly his lost snark.

  The laser was in good working order; he tested it by cutting through a branch near the one he was perched on. It took several seconds to cut the limb free; when at last it fell, it struck the dragon full on the head and bounced harmlessly to one side. The creature looked up at him accusingly. Its face was very expressive, easily as expressive as any housecat's, despite its huge and hairless head.

  This presented a target, and Slant did not miss the opportunity. He fired the laser at full intensity directly into the monster's already damaged right eye. It howled, a sound that hurt Slant's ears, and turned its head away. He changed his target accordingly and focused the beam on the back of its neck.

  There was a faint smell of cooking meat; the dragon growled and turned back, fangs bared, and the beam caught it in the eye again. It tried to close the eye, but the beam cut through the eyelid. It backed off a few steps, while Slant kept the laser aimed directly at the center of the eye.

  He could see a wound now, and thin fluid dribbled from it, mixing with blood from the bullet wounds. The creature had lost a great deal of blood, he noticed; it formed puddles on the road and was caked in the corners of eye, nose, and mouth.

  It continued to back slowly away, then paused, at about what Slant judged to be the limit of the laser's effective range. He guessed that the right eye must be almost completely useless by this time in any case, and switched the beam to the left. Although he doubted it would do much damage at this distance, he hoped to blind the creature at least temporarily and perhaps drive it away.

  The monster screamed, the same bird-of-prey cry it had used before, and charged forward at full speed, slamming its several tons against the base of the tree.

  The blow shook the tree, and Slant clutched at neighboring branches in an instinctive reaction far more basic than any conditioning he had had; in doing so he lost his grip on the laser. It slammed against a limb, then fell, bouncing from branch to branch, before lodging in a crotch a few meters below, in easy reach of the enraged monster. Slant immediately dismissed any thought of retrieving it

  He had now lost two of his weapons, laser and snark, though both were in plain sight. That left the machine-pistol, which had already proven ineffective. Nonetheless he drew it, rammed in another clip, and fired three quick shots at the dragon.

  As before, the bullets did little but anger the creature; it smashed at the trunk of the tree with a forepaw. This time Slant was more nearly ready, and kept hold of the gun.

  He continued firing, emptying the rest of the clip; he succeeded in wounding the monster, leaving streams of blood all over its back as well as its face and chest, but not in deterring it. It was now absolutely determined to get him, one way or another. He released and dropped the spent clip, and reached in his pocket for more ammunition.

  He found none. He checked other pockets; all were equally unhelpful, and he recalled that more than one object had been dropped when he lost the snark.

  He was unarmed. At least, he was unarmed by his standards. He did still have a large knife on his belt He drew it and looked at it carefully.

  It was a good knife, a steel blade more than twenty centimeters long and a short, heavy hilt. It was not intended for slaying dragons, but it was all he had.

  He looked down. The dragon was beginning to look unsteady; it was backing away from the tree, squinting upward through its one good—or relatively good, as the laser might have done s
ome damage before he lost it—eye. There was no point in waiting. He pushed out through the leaves and leaped from his branch, landing full on the monster's back.

  The creature, one-eyed, weak from loss of blood, and half mad with pain and rage, immediately whirled, trying to reach back with its claws or teeth to dislodge him. He avoided being flung headlong by plunging the knife into the dragon's side with one hand and grabbing a handful of rough, loose skin with the other.

  The beast screamed with pain as the knife went in; it paused in its frantic movement, as if trying to think, and Slant took the opportunity to pull the knife free and to plunge it into the monster's neck. There was a gout of blood from the first wound when the blade came free, and as it sank into the creature's neck the dragon went into convulsions. Slant had no chance of holding on; he was flung aside, leaving the knife where it was.

  He managed to land rolling, so that he was not seriously injured, but the left side of his body from shoulder to ankle was bruised by the impact. He had missed a tree by less than a meter.

  When he stopped rolling he lay motionless for a moment, feeling his body, making certain no permanent damage had been done; then he turned and watched the dragon.

  It was thrashing about, trying to get claws or teeth onto the hilt of the knife embedded in its neck. As he watched its struggles grew steadily weaker. Blood was seeping from the wound in ever-increasing streams as the creature's twisting enlarged the opening made by the blade. Slant pitied the poor thing; it had been following its instincts, nothing more.

  He rose carefully to his feet; the dragon paid no attention. If it could see him at all, it was more interested in its own injuries.

  His body hurt where he had fallen, and his fingers and forearms stung from the shock of being wrenched away from his hold on the beast's back, but he was otherwise intact. He moved around the dragon in a wide circle, toward his snark; he did not like being unarmed. If the thing did attack him again he wanted to be able to defend himself, and if it settled down again he wanted to be able to put it out of its misery. He did not like seeing it suffer and was reasonably certain that it could not survive the wounds he had inflicted.

  The thrashing stopped; the monster lay still on one side, panting heavily. It had finally managed to dislodge the knife from its throat, and blood poured from the open gash the blade had left. Its good eye, a baleful green-gold orb, stared at Slant, but the creature was obviously unable to do him further harm. The other eye was an oozing ruin.

  Slant reached the fallen branches his horse had jumped and found his snark and several clips of pistol ammunition scattered about; he retrieved all he could find, then looked back at the dragon. It was lying almost still, moved only by shallow breathing; it had tried to close its eyes, and the good one was shut, but the lid of the ruined one had been stopped by clotted blood and torn tissue while still halfway open.

  He tested the snark on nearby leaves; it still worked, raising a cloud of dust and leaving a hole.

  Cautiously, he approached the dying dragon. It showed no sign that it was aware of him as he positioned himself a little over a meter from its head and used the snark to cut a bloody hole through its skull and well into its brain.

  The dragon was unquestionably dead.

  The sound of clapping came from somewhere to one side; Ahnao's voice exclaimed, "That was wonderful!"

  Chapter Sixteen

  SLANT STARED AT HER FOR A MOMENT. SHE WAS STILL lying at the roadside where the monster had knocked her, applauding enthusiastically.

  "It was wonderful!" she repeated.

  "No, it wasn't," Slant replied. "It was hideous. What are you doing here?" He did not move from where he stood, the snark ready in his hand, as the girl rose and ran up to him.

  She reached out as though to embrace him; he raised the snark threateningly, and she stopped a couple of meters away. Her expression was surprised and hurt.

  "What are you doing here?" he demanded again.

  "I followed you."

  "That's obvious. Why?"

  "Why what?'

  "Why did you follow me? Why did you wake the dragon?"

  "I'm sorry; I didn't see it." She looked genuinely contrite. "I didn't mean to endanger you."

  "You forced me to kill it to save you."

  "I'm sorry, really. I didn't mean any harm."

  "Why did you follow me?"

  "I … I didn't know what else to do. With my uncle Kurao dead, there was no one to take care of me in Awlmei."

  "What about Furinar?"

  "He doesn't like me. Besides, he has a family of his own."

  "Then why not apprentice yourself to some other wizard?"

  "I don't know any other wizards."

  "Why can't you take care of yourself? You're a wizard, aren't you, even if you're just an apprentice?"

  "I couldn't do that!"

  "Why not?"

  "I just couldn't!" She once again looked surprised and hurt, as if Slant was being purposely cruel in asking her such a thing.

  He was silent for a moment, considering what to ask next.

  "Why come after me, though? What have I to do with you?"

  "You killed my uncle."

  "Are you after revenge, then?"

  "Oh, no, nothing like that! But he was my master, and you killed him. "

  Slant was afraid he was beginning to understand, "What has that to do with it?"

  She looked at the ground, abashed. "You're—you're responsible for leaving me unprotected, you see."

  "Am I to be your new protector, then? Did I win you by killing him, as the spoils of victory?"

  "I don't know; something like that, I guess."

  He stared at her in disbelief. "Are you serious?"

  She nodded.

  "Do you plan to stay with me, then?"

  She nodded again. "If you'll let me."

  "What if I don't let you?"

  "I don't know." She looked up at him. "Oh, please, though, let me stay with you! I don't have anywhere else to go!"

  "You could go back to Awlmei where you belong. Aren't you the heir to Kurao's shop? Couldn't you do something with that?"

  "You can have it, if you like."

  "I don't want it!"

  "Neither do I. I want to go with you."

  "You don't know where I'm going."

  "That doesn't matter."

  Utterly confounded, Slant said nothing more but just stared at her. He did not particularly want her around. If the computer was still active, it would probably order him to kill her, and he would probably obey one way or another; he was glad that he did not have to. He did not like her, but killing was unpleasant and regrettable, and after all the trouble he had gone to on her behalf in killing the dragon, he preferred not to throw his efforts away.

  He wondered if she was, as he had first thought, acting on behalf of the wizards of Awlmei. It certainly made more sense than her own bizarre explanation—or non-explanation. Perhaps she had been sent to spy on him, and was much smarter than she appeared.

  He had no objection to being spied on; he was doing no one harm. If she was a spy, and he sent her back, that might arouse suspicion and provoke further annoyances. She might be useful to have around; even an apprentice wizard was not something to be taken lightly, he was sure. He was in some degree responsible for her plight—though it was none of his doing that she felt herself incapable of living her life without some sort of protector.

  If she were a spy, she had probably been chosen on the theory that her sex would tend to allay suspicion; primitive people often had peculiar ideas about the relationship between men and women. She was attractive, he supposed; with his hormones strictly regulated, he had to judge such matters entirely on a theoretical basis. Had he possessed a normal male sex drive he would almost certainly have gone quietly insane or gotten himself killed long ago; fourteen years of celibacy were not a healthy thing.

  She probably expected her appearance to influence his decision, then, and if she had been se
nt, the wizards would expect the same. He would also be expected to consider her harmless, since in a pretechnological culture such as this women were not physically suited to be warriors and were therefore considered unfit for any sort of fighting at all.

  If she were a spy, it would be in his best interests to allow her to accompany him. If she were not a spy, though, she would be a nuisance, and he did not really believe her to be anything other than what she said she was.

  What would happen if he sent her back? He didn't know. It was possible she would pretend to go, then continue following him, at a distance. That would not do; he preferred to have her in sight. She might actually go back to Awlmei, but what would become of her after that he had no idea. It was possible she really was incapable of surviving on her own and would either die or find herself another protector, perhaps one less benevolent than Kurao or himself.

  What would become of her if she accompanied him?

  Well, he would probably be able to protect her as well as anyone could, though he couldn't continue her training in wizardry. She would tag along, eating his food and drinking his water. She might try to seduce him, but that would be nothing more than a minor nuisance. She might prove useful, since she was able to fly, however badly—he was fairly certain that it was she he had seen fall from the sky earlier. If he got the starship repaired and left the planet, he could take her with him for company. However foolish she might seem, she was a source of human companionship and professed to be willing to accompany him wherever he went.

  His growing loneliness decided him, finally. The computer was gone, Thurrel was gone, and he did not want to be alone. He could always get rid of her later, one way or another.

  "All right. Come help me with the horses."