Slaves of The Klau

by Jack Vance

  "They have eyes like the Klau."

  "They're a sub-species of Klau. There are Big Klau, Little Klau, Bornghaleze, Podruods-all Klau stock. The Podruods are the troops, the guards, the fighters."

  A metallic clatter rang out, accompanied by distant shouts. Barch, turning his head, saw a long feather-shaped boom vibrating back and forth across the sky. Overhead six white balls snapped past-one after the other, like rockets.

  He said in Komeitk Lelianr's ears, "This is bedlam."

  She nodded briefly. "Compared to other parts of Magarak it's quiet."

  The Podruod voice rang out above like a clarion. "Hey! Hey! Hey!" Directly behind them the fence opened. "I guess we move," muttered Barch.

  A sudden rush of gray bodies with frightened white faces surged past. Knobby shoulders pummeled Barch. "Ellen!" he cried. He looked all around desperately. "Ellen! Where are you? Ellen!"

  Arms thrust angrily at him, he was carried along the tide. "Ellen!" He thought he heard his name; he stopped to listen. Nothing but the shuffle and thud of feet, ringing shouts of the great red Podruods.

  A chute loomed ahead. Four abreast the Modoks scuttled up, jumped down into what appeared to be a long black barge. A Podruod with legs painted blue stood in the stern, his face working like rubber, yelling, crying.

  Barch craned his neck, searching the sea of alien faces. Fifty feet ahead he saw Komeitk Lelianr. "Ellen!" She turned her head. A great red hand obscured her face; she stumbled up the chute.

  A second chute opened at Barch's right; the Podruods roared new directions.

  Barch pushed forward, now shoving against the tide. He saw Komeitk Lelianr half-way up the chute. The Podruod roared, struck at him; the light-serpent snapped out.

  Barch fell to his knees; feet pressed around him, stepping on his hands, his legs.

  He crawled doggedly through, saw massive Podruod legs ahead. In sudden fury, he dove forward, tackled the legs. The great body toppled; the light-whip rolled in the dust. Barch snatched at it, missed. He rose to his feet, raced up the chute, pressed into the last of the group.

  From behind came a hoarse yelling; Barch, glancing over his shoulder, saw a clot of Modoks kicking at the great spiked head, smiling, laughing.

  Podruods came pounding along the ramp; light-snakes darted; the gray men dutifully marched into the chutes. The red man writhed, kicked on the ground like a beetle on its back.

  Barch pushed ahead. "Ellen!" He grasped her arm. "I thought I had lost you."

  She took his hand, squeezed it tight. Barch's heart gave a sudden throb of joy. It was almost worth coming to Magarak.

  A gate clanged behind them. The barge shuddered, rose into the air, slid clear of the slave yard.

  Barch and Komeitk Lelianr, the last aboard, leaned against the rail. Komeitk Lelianr motioned toward the panorama. "Now, look at Magarak…"

  CHAPTER IV

  The scene was too vast, too complex for mental grasp. Barch sensed flaring lights, gigantic objects in motion, monstrous shapes. Near at hand the lights were like openings into furnaces: yellow, orange, greenish-white, red; at the horizon they gleamed and flickered like stars.

  Heavy sound came at a constant grumbling pitch, so far-reaching that it seemed an intrinsic property of the planet. Across the sky moved endless shapes-booms swinging in low circles, black objects like spiders darting along glistening tracks, barges floating at various levels, blast of dark vapor. Then underneath were the buildings: grayish-white, greenish-gray, black, orange, some faintly etched with window lines, others blank as new paper. Between were dark crevasses flickering with yellow or bluish glow far at the bottom.

  Barch looked up into the sky, smoky, sooty, lumpy with low clouds. "Is it day or night? It must be day."

  Komeitk Lelianr asked wryly, "What do you think of Magarak?"

  "I feel like an ant in a thrashing machine," said Barch. He looked around the horizon. "How far does the madhouse go on?"

  "We must be on Kdoa," she mused. "A large continent- about five thousand of your miles wide."

  "Five thousand miles of this!"

  She nodded. "Underneath are the barracks, the commissaries, the nurseries."

  "Nurseries-for what?"

  "Slave children. Slaves are encouraged to breed. The women become pregnant often to avoid heavy work. The children make the best slaves; they know no other kind of life."

  Barch silently watched the shapes and lights of Magarak drift past below.

  "Do you still think you can"-she nodded-"defeat this?"

  Barch looked at her resentfully. "Do you think I won't try?"

  "No. I think you'll try. I think you'll end up on the grid." She added tonelessly, "That's where the slaves are punished."

  Barch stared over the side. Another barge drifted toward them, passed two hundred feet below. Barch saw six long dark shapes, like spindles, caught the white flash of upturned faces. The barges drifted apart.

  The sea spread leaden, listless; they drifted over dreary mud-flats. Ahead appeared a long black line which, as the barge drew near, broke up into clots of men, piles of cut stone, spidery cranes. A coffer dam of mud had been scraped up against the sea; in deep oozing pits, workers, moving slow as cold ants, fitted great stones together.

  "That's what you'll be doing," said Komeitk Lelianr in a flat voice.

  Barch stared down into the dismal pits. "And what happens to the women?"

  "Some other kind of work. Chipping stone, perhaps."

  They passed a barge loaded with granite blocks. Barch asked, "What keeps these barges up? Do they use the same machinery as the spaceships?"

  "I would imagine so." Her voice was disinterested. "The principle of plane-cohesion is fundamental."

  "But they could leave the planet?"

  "I suppose so." She watched the reclamation project fall astern. "We're not bound there, at least."

  The ocean shore curved away behind them; a range of mountains loomed dark ahead. The sky was darkening rapidly. The sun had settled beyond the overcast. "I wonder how much farther?" asked Barch.

  Komeitk Lelianr knit her brows. "If those mountains are the Palamkum, then that was Tchul Sea, and this is Kredbon instead of Kdoa. I think Xolboar Sea is beyond those mountains."

  "Then we get sorted out and put to work?"

  "I suppose so."

  Barch examined the mountains with interest. They were great masses of white rock, split by deep valleys and gorges. Black vegetation carpeted the valley slopes; snow gleamed on the high cols and peaks.

  Barch said in a hushed voice, "Can your shoes hold up both of us?"

  She looked at him first in startled wonder, then speculatively. "No."

  "Suppose we jumped off the barge."

  "If I could stay on my feet, we'd drop slowly."

  "We'd never be caught down there."

  She stared down into the dark wilderness. "We'd starve to death."

  "Maybe, maybe not. At least we would be free. We'd be out of the mud-pits, out of the slave barracks."

  She glanced at the Modoks, made up her mind. "Very well. Try to put your feet on top of mine."

  Barch looked over the side. They flew over a long valley. "Now," muttered Barch. "Are you ready?"

  "Yes."

  "Now!" He jumped up, straddled the rail. Komeitk Lelianr climbed nimbly after. Startled white faces turned. There was an excited chatter, a couple of arms tentatively outstretched.

  Barch bared his teeth, kicked. The commotion attracted the eye of the Podruod controller. With great lunging strides he came forward.

  "I'm ready," panted Komeitk Lelianr. "Step on my feet."

  Barch jumped down, clasped her around the waist; they toppled off into gray air. He glimpsed the rectangular hull of the barge slipping past overhead with a hundred little nubbins of heads silhouetted against the twilight. Sky and mountains whirled in sickening topsy-turvy motion.

  Komeitk Lelianr was crying in his ear. "My feet, my feet!"

  Barch clamped his le
gs around hers, set his feet on her instep. He felt a braking, the sky and mountains steadied.

  Looking anxiously aloft he saw the raft drifting quietly on; the cargo was fuzzy gray, like a load of jute. He turned his eyes down. A massive crag, like a rotten tooth, stabbed up at them with frightening velocity; below was the vast slot of a valley, the shining trickle of a river.

  "We're braking," she said. "The lower we get, the slower we fall."

  Barch relaxed, tried to follow her as she shifted weight. Dark fronds of vegetation reached up at them. Thirty feet… twenty feet… ten feet…

  There was the crash, scatter, agitation of breaking stems and snapping branches. Barch saw the ground, the black humus of the hillside; at six feet he jumped, so as not to land with Komeitk Lelianr's feet under his. She cried out in surprise. Relieved of Barch's weight, she bounced back into the air. She caught at branches swung back and forth like an acrobat, then slowly settled, to the ground.

  They had landed on a high slope. The sky was a black ceiling overhead; dank wind blew roaring through the valley below. Trees flapped and clattered; from the far distance came a harsh gurgling whistle. Komeitk Lelianr whispered, "What's that?"

  Barch said, "It's breakfast, if I can catch it."

  "In the dark it might catch you."

  They looked down the slope, found the river. "We'll be warmer up here," said Barch, "out of the valley. We'd better not build a fire until we learn more about the country."

  In a little hollow under a rock he piled moss, dry humus, and contrived a covering of fronds wrenched down from the trees. "Like sleeping in a haystack," said Barch. "You get in first."

  Rain fell during the night, but the wind blew it over the rock, and they stayed dry. Magarak morning came damp and gray.

  "Ouch!" said Barch, "my aching bones." He felt his face. "At least, no whiskers. I've got your father to thank for that."

  Komeitk Lelianr sat brushing moss off her gray smock. Barch went on cheerfully. "Next-breakfast. Are you hungry?"

  She made no answer.

  Barch rose to his feet, looked carefully up and down the hillside. The trees by daylight were like kelp: black and brown, with red veins along the leaves. Overhead the sky was heavy with clouds.

  Barch pulled down a branch, broke free a cluster of nuts. He broke one of these open, smelled, recoiled from the acrid odor. "No nourishment here. Let's see what's down by the water."

  Cautiously they made their way downhill to the river. Standing in a pool was a blackish-green creature with the head of an owl, a bat's wings, the legs of a heron. It watched them approach, then fluttered up, flapped croaking off down the valley.

  "That's a good sign," said Barch. "It means that there's something to be caught. That bird wasn't just taking a bath."

  "We catch things-then eat them?"

  "We're savages now," said Barch airily. "Both of us, remember?"

  "I remember very well."

  Barch crept forward, crouched down by the edge of the pool. Water swirled quietly over round stones of various colors. He scanned the bottom. One of the round stones moved. Barch grabbed shoulder-deep into water like ice, came up with a squirming bulb. Dangling tentacles flapped, wound around his wrist; his skin burned as if singed with flame. Barch cursed, threw the bulb up on the shore. It scuttled toward the river. Barch kicked it back, dropped a chunk of rock on it. When he picked up the rock, there was nothing below but a mat of whitish fibers and ooze.

  Barch turned away in disgust. A red weal had formed along his wrist, the bones of his forearm ached. "Let's go on downstream," he said through his teeth. "Maybe we'll find something a little less hard to get along with."

  The river flowed smoothly a hundred yards, then began to drop. It pounded over step-like ledges, split itself against boulders. Scrambling over the wet rocks, Barch almost fell a dozen times. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Komeitk Lelianr walking serenely two or three feet over the river.

  Said Barch quizzically, "I wish I had a pair of sandals."

  Komeitk Lelianr made no reply.

  "How long will the power hold out?" Barch asked.

  "With steady use, perhaps a month or two."

  "And how high can you walk?"

  "Two or three hundred feet. Higher, if I take care."

  "Suppose you walk up fifty feet, and tell me what you see."

  Swaying and stepping as if walking on stilts, she rose into the air. The wind caught her, carried her drifting down the valley.

  Barch scrambled over the rocks to keep abreast. "What do you see?"

  "Rocks, more black trees, a lake."

  "No smoke? No buildings?"

  "Nothing." She came back down in great sliding steps. "Do you dunk we'll find anything to eat?"

  "Of course," Barch said confidently. "Down by the lake, perhaps."

  A few minutes later the valley widened. Before them spread the lake, roughly circular, surrounded first by a rim of marsh, then a strip of open slope overgrown with thorny bush. Each bush terminated in a tight green sac, like a greengage. Barch picked one, split it, smelled of the pulp. "Rather like lemon verbena, or bay turn."

  Komeitk Lelianr said in practical tones. "It's likely to be poisonous."

  Barch smelled again, doubtfully. "One can't hurt me too much…"

  "It might make you sick."

  "Then we'll know it's poison; there's nothing like the empirical method." He bit into the sac, chewed thoughtfully. "It doesn't taste very good."

  "Look," said Komeitk Lelianr. "There's that flying thing again."

  Barch dropped the thorn-berry, watched the owl-headed, bat-winged, heron-legged creature slide to an awkward landing along the shore of the lake.

  "If we can catch him," said Barch, "we'll have roast owl." He bent, picked up a rock, moved cautiously forward.

  The owl-bat-heron waded out into the lake-stopped short, one leg high in the air. The leg jerked forward, jerked back up; a black shape twisted through the air, fell into the thorny thicket.

  "That looks like a fish," exclaimed Barch. The bird stalked toward his catch. Barch ran forward, waving his arms. "No you don't." Gingerly he picked the black fish out of the thorns, while the owl-bat-heron scuttled back into the water. Komeitk Lelianr watched with distaste.

  Barch tossed her his cigarette lighter. "You build a fire, I'll clean this thing."

  He set it on a flat rock beside the river, sawed off head and tail with a sharp flake of stone. Gritting his teeth, he split open the soft belly, pulled, scraped, washed, and eventually had two strips of leathery white flesh.

  Komeitk had started a fire by the edge of the forest; Barch secured a pair of green twigs, carefully roasted the fish for them.

  "There," he said, "that smells pretty good." He laid the fish on a rock, licked his fingers. "It even tastes good."

  Komeitk Lelianr ate without comment.

  "It's not too filling," said Barch, "but we won't starve today." He looked back to the green thorn-berries. "They didn't taste good-but I don't feel any pangs yet." He covered over the fire. "Now we'd better explore."

  A distant explosion jarred the air. Echoes rumbled away down the valley. "What's that?"

  Komeitk Lelianr stood listening. "Probably there's a stone quarry somewhere over a mountain."

  Barch anxiously scanned the mountainside. "We've got to explore, find out where the nearest settlement is, if there is one."

  "And then what?"

  "We'll know more when we see how the land lies. If we could steal one of those barges somehow we might…" His voice trailed off into silence. He caught Komeitk Lelianr, pulled her down behind a thorn-bush. "Quiet!"

  Across the lake three men stood like pillars of gray rock.

  "They've seen us," whispered Komeitk Lelianr.

  "I don't think so. I saw them come out of the forest."

  "If they come around this way, they'll see us."

  "They're coming." Barch took round heavy stones in each hand, waited tensely for them.
/>   CHAPTER V

  Two of the men were dark-skinned, with faces thin and foxlike; the third was lemon-yellow, with a flat round face, orange eyebrows tufted like horns. They moved with a soft stealthy tread that suggested the wariness of deer.

  "They've got bows and arrows," muttered Barch. "They can't be either slaves or keepers."

  "Perhaps they're fugitives too," said Komeitk Lelianr.

  The men drew closer, the sound of their voices came across the marsh. Through the thorns Barch could see every detail of their faces, their clothes. Twenty yards away they stopped short, turned to look down the valley.

  Faint in the distance came a sound like a bugle call, then another from a different direction, then another, startlingly close. The three men hissed in sudden fright, bounded off up the hillside, disappeared under the blanket of black fronds.

  Barch uneasily rose to his feet, looked across the lake.

  "Whatever it is, it's certainly not good. We'd better leave too."

  Komeitk Lelianr seized his ankle. "Get down," she whispered, "Podruods!"

  Barch dropped flat on his face. Out of the forest sprang a lithe red figure. He stood poised, raised his spiked head, called; bugle tones rang across the lake.

  He waited. Answering calls like hunting horns returned from the distance.

  The Podruod stood like a statue; Barch and Komeitk Lelianr hugged the marshy ground.

  There was a crashing of branches, thudding of hasty feet. A fat man with a conical tuft of pink hair stumbled into the clearing. He saw the Podruod, froze like a bird. The Podruod watched him without moving a muscle. The fat man cautiously started to slip around the lake. The Podruod made a leap forward, halted. Barch thought of a cat with a mouse.

  The Podruod once more raised his head, again the brass voice rang out. Behind the fat man two more Podruods jumped into the clearing. The fat man ran frantically, panting and groaning.

  A shadow passed over Barch's head; he looked up with a convulsive jerk that hurt his neck. It was a raft ten feet long, four feet wide, carrying a Klau. If the Klau had looked down he might have seen Barch and Komeitk Lelianr, but his eyes were on the fat man.