“Press that!” I motioned to the button.
He smiled at Lisa in the hovair's glow. “No 'fraid, young being, only loud broom.” He pressed it.
I yelled as ceiling rock split with a crack like close thunder and crashed down. Boulders tumbled between us and the retreating guards. Loose soil dumped into the passage. So then, I thought, not all the trunnel, I mean tunnel, was organic.
“Trake it,” he said.
I coughed on dust. “Trake what?” I heard men shout as they headed for the entrance, and hoped that Tikkie was OK.
“Thring!” In the hovair's light, I saw his silver eyes with slitted pupils as he peered through thick strands of burned-umber hair and delicately handed me the stingler with a thumb and forefinger. “We people clear trunnel when ravagers are gone.”
“OK,” I said. “Whatever.”
With the hovair's dusty light guiding us, we started down the tunnel. He gently touched Lisa's face. “You safe now. Briertrush care you, young thring.”
Real comforting, that.
The Kubraen found a floating golden blob cluster and tied the glassy tentacle ends to the shoulder of his tunic. The cluster provided a diffused light and I put away the hovair, but with the Kubraen's seven foot height, the blob bounced off the ceiling as he walked.
I glanced at Lisa and fingered the stingler. “I thought you didn't harm species?” I told him and gestured toward the blob.
“Threse hold no consciousnesh.”
“You mean they're dead?”
He chuckled, a wispy grate through long lips. The upper one was split down the middle. “Never life, humane.”
“Oh.” I sniffed near him and smelled the aroma of maple syrup. Lisa looked at me and I felt her relief. What was she reading from him?
“Mister, you smell like – “
'”Never mind, Lis'!” She clung to Briertrush, her head against his thick hoary shoulder, unafraid of the twin breathing slits that opened and closed above his long shriveled mouth, the blocky head. She must've gotten some very good mental vibes from him.
“I'll take her now,” I said, jogging to keep up with his lumbering slab-footed gait.
He smiled at Lisa, who smiled back. “Not difficult ta hold young,” he said gently. “Name wha?”
“Her name's Lisa. Do you have human food at the village?”
He nuzzled her face with pursed dry lips and she giggled and scratched her cheek. “Have
Trerran…Terran deliciousys ah?” he whispered to her.
“You knew we were coming?” I asked.
“Knew probable soon.”
“The, uh, silver being tell you about us?”
“Know silver being not at all. Trake cut.”
“Shortcut?”
“Cuts short.”
We skirted rusty pumping equipment along one scarred passage. “What do the Kubraens use this for?” I asked.
He hissed in the darkness. “Kubraens use thris na a tall. Thris humane vice.”
“Device?”
“Yesh.”
“Mining device?”
He threw me a pained look, hunched his shoulders and strode faster. ”Are all the mines played out? I mean, finished?”
“Frinished. Yesh. All is frinished. All mines too.” He stopped suddenly, put Lisa down and pushed against a portion of the seamless rock wall. A slab moved smoothly aside. Behind it, darkness. Briertrush picked up Lisa and nodded for me to enter.
“What does this lead to?” I asked.
“Saftry.”
I went in cautiously, hoping I could trust him as I contemplated this new fork in mine and Lisa's destiny, and waited for him to pull the slab back in place. “So there are no more crystals left?” I asked as I followed him.
He hissed. “Humanes care only fo crystals.”
“Not all of us.”
He extended a long-fingered hand.
“What?”
He nodded toward my jacket pocket. It bulged with the crystal inside.
“Oh. This.” I fished it out and handed it to him.
“Yesh. Thris!”
I shrugged. “Uh, where'd your people learn about Terran cooking?” I asked to lighten things.
“There wasp a ship come once ta trade. We give black root flowers ta leader, ah?” He spread knobby hands, to show it was a large bouquet, I think. “He give Terran crookbush.” He took a sudden left turn down a twisted passage.
A thought struck me as I ran to catch up. “His…the leader's name. It wasn't Bjorn?”
“Be Orn.” He clicked his teeth. “Yesh!”
I stopped. Oh, no! pickled rhubarb, brains, oyster balls.
Lisa looked at me and made a face.
The tunnel meandered, forked, split into dark passages, but Briertrush moved ahead at a fast pace, easily carrying Lisa, his broad feet slapping rocky ground.
“Daddy, you think Tikkie's OK?”
“Sure. Tikkie's survived a lot worse than this. He'll probably head back to the ranch and beg that woman for a handout.”
“You think she'll feed him? You think so?”
'She'll feed him, Lis'.” I thought of the big brown dog, wondered how he felt about his smaller brethren, and hummed to cover that thought from Lisa. The smell of syrup thickened as the tunnel broadened. Ahead, lights and the murmur of voices.
Hunger pangs sharpened and I looked at Lisa. Hers or mine? She lifted fingers off Briertrush's shoulder and waved them at me.
“Soon, baby. Don't be fussy about the food, OK?”
“I'm so hungry, Daddy, I could eat a whole space bear. Two space bears! Three
whole – ”
“OK.” But could she swallow pickled rhubarb or brains and eggs? “How about pig food?”
She made a face.
We came to a pool of that lead-smooth liquid. It bubbled across the path and Briertrush stopped in his tracks.
“We could skirt it,” I offered. “It doesn't look deep at the edges.”
“Questron here not of deaf.” He stared at the pool. “Questron of deferensh.” He took the crystal from his tunic and gently rolled it into the center of the pool, where it dissolved.
JesusChristLotus, I thought. “Deference?” I asked.
He grunted and slowly wagged his head from side to side. Lisa wagged her head too, then touched his elongated ear, which curled like squashed tel-link receivers.
I let the question lie as he led me into a narrow bypass tunnel. Perhaps our definitions of deference were different. I touched a wall carving of a tube, open-ended on either side and full of raised painted symbols.
Briertrush stopped to watch me, his naked eyebrows knit, his shadow flitting across laser-scarred walls. “Understand you diffrent. Flamedrum, Dance?”
I shook my head.
“No mattra. No diffrent Terran flamedrum.” He traced a finger along the tube symbols, then touched his groin, his neck and his forehead.
“You'll have to tell me about that sometime.” I nodded toward the carving. Seemed more discreet than nodding toward his groin. The aroma of smoky cookfires wafted toward us as the passage opened on a broad maze of arched caves intersected by paths that disappeared in a confusion of bends.
Within the lumpy niches, Kubraens dressed in tunics, with shawls over their craggy shoulders, and wearing leggings, sat on woven mats. Some talked quietly in their soft lisping tongue. Some stirred clay pots of simmering food which dangled over fires from wooden tripods. Smoke flowed up through vents in domed, heat-blackened ceilings. The walls, glazed to amber by firelight, were hung with woven tapestries of stars, planets, suns, with wooden masks, bowls, and carved circles within circles within circles.
“Thris our home now, humane.”
“It's very nice.”
He slid me a slitted look. Was a compliment the wrong move? I thought on refugee camps.
Daddy! she sent.
Yesh? I mean yes?
This looks like the dream I had when I was home.
Like this? You
had a dream about this place?
“Uh huh. Beartush was in it too.”
Briertrush looked at her.
Briertrush, I mentally corrected. A spark of fear ran through me. Exactly like this, Lis'? Are you sure?
She spread her hands and said aloud, “It wasn't scary, like the Cleocean doll. It was fun!”
Briertrush turned those silver cat eyes on me. I smiled a quick smile and continued walking. I'm glad it was fun, baby. But from now on, let's do all our talking the regular way, OK?
Did the Kubraens already know about our tel-links? After all, they'd known we were coming.
Lisa rested her head on Briertrush's broad shoulder. “OK. I wish Mommy and Grandma and Grandpa were here so they could meet my new friends.”
“What about Uncle Charles?”
She shook her head. I guess that shouldn't have made me feel good, but I smiled inwardly. The blob threw light on a wall carving that looked like a planet, with land masses and oceans. I traced it with fingers across the ocher wall. It felt as smooth and warm as melted caramel. From a flickering passage came a song that seemed, in its tone and rhythm, and perhaps in its sublimely held notes, to catch the shape of life's joys, then plunge down to the tragedy of its final partings.
The aliens, who ranged in color from charcoal to shades of brown, buff and ivory, paused in their tasks as we walked the path between caves, and silently stared. The scrape of my shoes and the snap of fires were the only sounds.
I stood in front of Lisa, who was still in Briertrush's arms, as some of the people rose and quietly approached. They watched us with open curiosity. Loops of wooden beads clicked around their waists and ankles. The light-colored individuals moved stiffly and I had the impression that they were the older ones.
Timid, gentle, the holo had said. But the xenologists who'd briefly studied this race didn't have their kids along.
“What do they want?” I asked Briertrush.
“Only ta see young thring. An ta welcome you.”
I lifted Lisa out of his arms and kept her at my side as the tall, loose-jointed aliens crowded in.
“It's OK, Daddy.” She smiled and reached out, touching their legs, yanking on their tunics. “It's just like in the dream.”
“Sure it is, baby.” But her dream hadn't included our invasion of the planet or the look in Briertrush's eyes when I'd mentioned the mines or when we'd first entered this refugee camp. I closed a hand over the stingler. Briertrush's slab hand folded over mine. He sniffed hard through narrowed nose slits. “Thris welcome, humane.”
Lisa giggled as a muscular charcoal male gently poked her cheek. “They want to be friends, Daddy.”
Briertrush took his hand off mine and I took mine of the weapon. After all, the people showed no signs of aggression.
An old, stooped albino female, I guessed by the two rows of shriveled breasts hanging inside her loose tunic, lifted a fist whose blue veins showed through transparent patches of skin and knuckles, unfolded it and held out a diminutive human doll. It reflected pastel colors in firelight.
“Ah?” she exclaimed to Lisa and wagged her head from side to side. Hair like frozen mercury slapped her wide mouth as it opened to a smile, showing blue gums, and teeth worn down to stubs. The doll, limp on the woman's frost-white hand, its blue eyes staring, seemed formed from silver and crimson clay.
Lisa drew in a breath and reached for it, then hesitated and looked at me.
“OK. Say thank you,” I told her.
She did.
The woman nodded from side to side, her long mouth stretching toward translucent ears. She brushed Lisa's fingers as she handed her the doll. “I, Gwis,” she stated in a thin shred of a voice and cackled softly.
“My name's Lisa. Are you very old?”
Gwis smiled and dipped her head sideways. “Shoon Gwis…” She raised a hand and spread her fingers, as though she held a large curved object. The others reached around her to touch Lisa and shifted feet in a rhythm that verged on dance. “Shoon Gwis sunseek.”
A crowd had gathered, and I heard the slap of feet as others hurried from passages, beads clacking, to see the Terran child.
I was also graciously welcomed, but I flinched from the touches all over my body, though they were discreet enough to stay away from the more sensitive areas, and the stingler. My backside was fair game, though. Their breath had a honey aroma, and I wondered if their smell was the result of diet. Then what did I smell like to them?
A tawny male took off a string of neck beads. I lifted my arms as he tied them around my waist, under the jacket, and thanked him with a sideways nod.
He chuckled, glanced at Briertrush, and stepped back.
Briertrush reached for Lisa. I was about to let her hand go when I glanced down at the bead string and realized my stingler was gone. I stepped toward the tawny male. “Where's my gun?”
He lifted empty hands and dipped his head.
”Then who's got it?” I pushed roughly past him.
Briertrush moved closer to me. “A word I promish ta you. Return I thris weapon when yo ready are fo your mission.”
How much did he really know about the silver being and our purpose here? More than I did, I thought.
He let me pull my arm away but his long curved mouth lost its color. Anger, I guessed. I glanced away. He reached down for Lisa again, and looked at me from under spiky bangs, hissing softly. Lisa put her hands on his arms and smiled up at me.
I nodded stiffly and he picked her up.
“See you, Julesh, how young humane trush all peoples. Learn you thris lesshon,” he whispered intimately.
Trust gets you kicked out of your homes, Kubraen, and turns you into refugees, I thought but didn't say. Lisa looked at me, her blue eyes holding mine with a questioning stare, her creased brows hinting at disapproval.
I shrugged. I'd have to remember to control my verbal thoughts when she was close. How close?
I'd test our tel operating distance when we had a chance.
Taller than most of his people, Briertrush lifted Lisa high and gargled happily in his throat. The people responded by raising arms and chanting: “Lisha. Lisha. Lisha.”
I looked around. “What the hell's going on?” I asked no one.
“Beartush?” Lisa patted his hand.
Silence fell.
“Yesh, Lisha!”
“Can we eat now?”
Where were the children? I wondered as Briertrush led us to his cave and introduced us to Reuf, a sienna male, much smaller than he, and Lyella, a golden female with stiff burnished braids that ended in twists of small woody pods. They rolled around her shoulders as she moved. Reuf and Lyella nodded sideways at me, and smiled at Lisa as they prepared supper.
I nodded back, sideways. They looked at each other and their lips twitched toward a smile. Oh well. I had tried. Ruef moved away from the fire to give Lisa and me the choice place on a large woven mat.
“Thank you,” I said, and took off Lisa's jacket, my own, and sank to the mat with a groan. Lisa huddled beside me and we watched Lyella deftly flatten dark dough into cakes on a wooden dish. Ruef stuffed the cakes with orange pulp, folded the dough, tucked edges, and slipped them into a stone pot of bubbling liquid over the fire. It smelled tart and spicy, good enough to eat, but I knew better.
“I'm so hungry, Daddy.”
I hugged her against me.
Briertrush retreated to a dark niche in the cave's rear. Something crinkled and he returned with a brown paper bag marked Laurel's Fast N' Healthy Foods to Live By.
“What's in there?” I asked.
“Good humane thrings.” Humming deep in his throat, he sat, crosslegged, wagged his head at Lisa and removed containers from the bag. I pictured sautéed goose liver and oyster balls, but couldn't connect them with the smells.
Lisa opened a container and gasped. “Look, Daddy!” She reached inside, withdrew a fistful of french fries.
“You like Catch up?” Briertrush spread red packets of ketchu
p before her. “Or mush hard?” He spread packets of mustard.
“Ketchup!” Lisa bit off a packet's end and spread ketchup on the fries.
Briertrush removed more containers, gave Lisa a soyburger, offered me two, and fries, and cold coffee and small rolled apple pies in paper sleeves. “Like you thris, Julesh?”
I opened the roll, studied the soyburger and chuckled. “I'll take a chance.” I bit into it. “It's delicious! What happened to Bjorn's cookbook?”
He hunched forward, elbows on knees. “Couldna understan one word ta Terran page.”
“Good!” I took another bite. ”Wha brains an' eggs an' oysta thresticles?”
I laughed. “Balls. Don't worry about it.”
One container held something green. I opened it. Broccoli! ”Eat thris, young Lisha,” our host urged. “You grow brig as Briertrush.”
I shook my head. I'm about six feet, and Briertrush loomed over me at his seven-foot height. He clacked teeth, pulled the lid off a cup of milk and set it before Lisa. She giggled with a mouthful of fries. “If I grow that brig, I won't be able to fit in my house anymore! I'll get stuck! Like Alice in Wonderland.”
Wonderland, indeed.
“Eat slow, Lis',” I said. “Briertrush, where did you… You went into Laurel for this stuff?” I looked at the food. “They'll know we're with your people.”
“Haf friens, Briertrush haf, in humane habitrat. Threy bruy me thris food ta Terran swift food.”
“Fast food,” I corrected.
“Threy Terrans against siar.”
“Against the czar? You have friends in some sort of a rebel movement?”
He flicked back lips.
“So, these rebels told you we were coming?”
He glanced at Ruef, then talked to him in Kubraen. Ruef went to a corner, returned with something rectangular under a cover and set it down. Briertrush lifted the cover. A sublink. A goddamn Terran sublink! ”Hear from rebels with thris ear.” Briertrush stroked the unit and touched dials. I put down the burger and reached for the link. “Here, let me see that. I can reach an Interstel field branch on this.” For what it was worth, I thought, if Interstel were really corrupt.
He shook his head, a definite shake, not a wag. “No off-planesh contact anywhrere. Control siar…czar ta spacelinks.” The wrinkles between his eyes deepened. “Control czar all.”
Halcyon Nights (Star Sojourner Book 2) Page 12
