Diadem from the Stars

by Clayton, Jo;

  She slammed the shutters closed and shoved the bar back in place. Inside, she could scarcely see the packs sitting in the middle of the floor. After a few attempts accompanied by a lot of lurid language, she managed to light a candle stub. Planting it in the middle of the hearth, she leaned back, stretched, dragged her fingers through her hair, then scratched industriously. “Ai-mi, will I ever get used to riding?” She examined her fingernails. “And I need a bath.”

  After supper she sat cross-legged on a piece of tufan in front of the fireplace. The golden-red light played comfortably on her face while the wind howled around the corners of the cabin, though the storm had dwindled to a few scattered raindrops. She sighed with pleasure as a comfortable warm peace lapped around her. Leaning forward with her elbows resting on her knees, she stared into the flames until she sank into a doze.

  The brightness spread and reached out, encompassing the two horses dozing behind the house … reached out … a tars walked the dark wetness of the forest, stalking a fral that sheltered in a raushani tangle … dark red blood-hunger … blind green panic … sliding on … warm sleep thoughts deep under earth … feel pull of cool and patient laughing water in deep-swift river … slow … slow … slow … slow … aeon-turning tree cycles … and threading through the whole a sense of watching, calm warm wisdom … guiding … nudging … watching over.…

  She became aware of herself as a separate self again. She was afloat in a drifting current of light, turning, rising, falling, immersed in liquid golden glow, then lifting out again … slow at first, then faster, sweeping toward a grouped pulsing brightness … coiling around.…

  A sharp crack … a small intense pain … jerked abruptly back to here-and-now, Aleytys looked down. A pinpoint of light burned on her knee, a spark smoldering in the abba cloth. With a quavery startled laugh, she flicked the spark back onto the stone and crushed the smolder out with her thumb. Then she stretched and yawned, scrunching around onto her side. Resting her hand on her arm, she stared once more into the fire.

  Body warm and relaxed, comfortably tired, she watched pictures form and die liquidly across the coals. Her mind floated out again. The tars was feeding … a bright blue aura, shining killer glow. Nausea soured her mouth. Eyes closed, she moved restlessly on the tufan. Animal, predator, true to its nature … man is a predator, too, she thought uneasily. She merged deeper with the tars, savored the salty heat of the bloody chunks of meat … blazingly alive … stalking free and wild … tear, claw, chew, swallow … quivering chunks of bloody meat … juices coursing down an eager throat … kill … muscles moving in perfect harmony … aware.… aware … more than animal … less perhaps than man.…

  Aleytys shook herself free, a little ashamed, more than a little surprised at the wild places in herself. The fire was dying down to a mass of red-black coals. Using a branch as a poker, she spread these out and laid on a hefty load of wood. That should last a while, she thought.

  She picked up the candle and started to turn away. The slanting shadows danced across the stone and dipped into incised lines as she turned her head, bringing out with startling vividness a series of words cut into the stone. She brought the candle closer and traced out the words.

  “Talek-i-quleh. Talek’s hold, vadi Kard. My landlord must belong to the Kard. That should mean …” She laughed and tossed her hair out of her face. “The river could be the Kard. Maybe. I don’t know … anyway, I follow it. I’ll probably get back to the trade road. Right direction, anyway.” She rubbed her fingers over the stone. “Good with his hands.” She stretched and yawned, then moved across the plank floor to the bed.

  Snug between the blankets, she closed her eyes, but her brain kept circling in the old tired circles, plotting. The Kard, she thought Vajd … no! Two weeks’ ride along the trade road.… I’ve—if the dreams were true—I think they’re true.… Vajd.… Once again she fled the ache of loneliness the name burned in her. I don’t have to worry or hurry now … no one on my backtrail … stay here a while … couldn’t find a better place.… Chalak … Vari … Twanit … ah, I miss you all. Mother was wrong, I need people. Vajd, I need you. Ah, Madar … I keep … I need him. It’s cold, cold, cold … alone.…

  Finally sleep thickened like fog over her tired mind.

  5

  She stretched, emerging reluctantly from the comfortable darkness. Shoving the blankets back, she thrust her legs over the edge of the bed and pulled herself onto her feet. The cabin was still gloomy dark with the shutters closed and the door shut. Although a few stray drafts crept along the floor, the air was stuffy enough to give her a shadow of a headache.

  Outside, Horli was up over the trees with Hesh still traveling across her belly. The morning was heating up quickly, but was still bearable, so she wandered out across the grass of the soggy meadow letting the black muck squish up between her toes, the morning breeze blow through her tangled hair and over her skin. She sat down on a wide fiat rock the flood-waters of thaw had tumbled down from the mountains that cut a dark blue line across the sky in the west. The smooth green water eddied in a river pool at one side of the boulder as it thrust out into the river. She edged forward and leaned over the pool, catching broken glimpses of herself in the slowly circling water. Her skin was several shades darker, a kind of golden brown like, a ripe peach. Nice, she thought approvingly. Too bad Vajd … She shied away from thinking of him and tugged nervously at her hair. The uniform redness was streaked with lighter patches and the tresses hung in lank oily strands. She grimaced. Better hunt up some soapweed, she thought I can’t stand to feel so grimy.

  Resolutely banishing all troublesome thoughts from her mind, she wandered in and out of the trees, searching out useful herbs and generally getting to know the new neighborhood. She slipped into a clean abba as the suns climbed higher in the sky and sat down on a flat-topped boulder where she swished a few wild lettuce leaves in the water until they were crisp and cold and watched the river flow past her feet as she nibbled at them.

  The silence around her was oppressive, a complete absence of human noise that kept jabbing at her, kept reminding her that she was alone, totally alone, for the first time in her life. She flicked the remains of the lettuce in the water and watched it float off. Maybe … maybe if I stay here and let the fires burn down till … maybe I could go back. She kicked at the water and dreamed until the suns got so hot she had to retreat.

  Later that afternoon she scrubbed herself and did a wash, beating her abbas energetically against the rocks along the river bank, scrubbing at them with the remains of the soapweed she’d used on herself. With one thing and another she managed to pass the day without sinking too deeply in her growing depression. As the top of Horli slid behind the mountains, she called the horses back from their grazing and shut them into the crude stable behind the cabin. This night she didn’t stay up in front of the dying fire but slipped between the blankets, determinedly banishing thought from her mind.

  The next day was harder. Sleep eluded her far into the night.

  The third day she wandered restlessly about in aimless circles, bathed twice, washed her hair again, mounted the stallion and rode him around and around the meadow to harden her thighs, shifted the tack around the walls, unpacked and repacked the pack sacks, and swept the cabin out with a twig broom. Late in the afternoon, she sat cross-legged and went through the breathing exercises Vajd had taught—not too successfully, but they brought a measure of calm to her jagged nerves.

  A blackness prowled around the edges of her mind, increasing her nervousness.

  That night she watched Hesh and Horli slide behind the mountains with a kind of quiet desperation. Reluctantly she pulled the door shut and dropped the bar with a solemn chunk into the slots. The fire spread a pleasant warmth and a soothing red-gold light through the room. She stretched out on the tufan and stared petulantly into the little tongues of fire that danced over the coals.

  The blackness that had wandered at the edge of awareness all day prowled closer.
There was a tars out there sniffing around. A little alarmed, she reached out cautiously and fingered his brain. Odd. There was curiosity there, a drive to know that was almost human … not instinctive like a smaller cat’s, but purposeful, driven by self-conscious intelligence. He felt her. She was sure of it. He wasn’t frightened, wasn’t angry, just curious. There was a sense of a strong personality. She drowsed on the tufan and teased at his consciousness while she remembered what she’d read about the tars. It was not exactly reassuring.

  The tars was a predator, a big catlike animal half the size of a horse, owning a long limber body that terminated in a whiplike tail. His muscles slipped beneath his short silky fur with powerful grace when he ran and he could outrun all land animals in his native mountains. His feet were toed with thick pads permitting a springy maneuverability, long leaps, and surefooted prancing from rock to rock. The front toes were longer, almost thick fingers, and he was remarkably dextrous with them … and strong—one blow from one of those forepaws with the claws unretracted could tear a man in half. She shuddered to think what he could do to her, but strangely enough she wasn’t afraid; there was no menace in him for her. His head was triangular with powerful jaws and large round eyes that shone yellow in the daylight and a fierce green at night. Those eyes had three sets of eyelids that, could be lowered individually or in combination for protection in widely varying conditions, so that he had the sensitivity needed for excellent night vision, yet could stand the searing light of the brightest summer day. His forehead bulged in a wide dome between tubular mobile ears, promising considerable development of the forebrain. According to the books, he was a formidable quarry it was far better to leave alone, since for every tars taken at least three hunters died.

  He prowled around outside for a little longer, then slipped away to hunt. Aleytys sighed and crawled into bed, feeling, as she drifted into sleep, a little less lonely—as if she’d found a companion, maybe even a friend.

  6

  The hook with its fragment of worm flipped up and dropped into the water with a tiny plop where the current on the edge of the eddy caught it and danced it downstream. A slim shadow flashed from the eddy and leaped at the worm. As the fish took the bait, Aleytys set the hook with a swift jerk on the line. Flashing silver-copper in the ruddy morning light, it leaped out of the water, splashed back in a cascade of crystal droplets, leaped again. The line swished through her fingers.

  With a grin, she scrambled to her feet and caught the fish in midleap with a rapid twitch of the line, snapping it out over the bank. She pounced on the flapping fish but dropped it immediately, yelping as it slipped around in her clutching hands and poked needle-pointed fin spines into the soft flap of skin between her thumb and forefinger.

  She knelt and thrust the hand into the water, then examined it after the sting had been chilled away. A series of blue-purple punctures marched along the inner edge of her palm, stopping just below the first knuckle of her forefinger. She sucked at the punctures until she could taste the faint saltiness of blood. The stiffness went away and she closed her hand into a fist, laughing triumphantly.

  The fish was still flapping weakly. Wrinkling her nose, Aleytys picked it up, fingers pinched together just below the vein-thin tail. She worked the hook out of its mouth, humming cheerfully, even chanting a little song as she worked. “Da da dada dee da da, pretty little devil.” She tossed the hook away and slipped the pin through its gills, then dropped the string of fish back in the water.

  On the rock again she worked another worm half onto the hook and dropped it back into the water. She flipped her hair out of her face and lay back on the warm granite. Her eyes half closed in lazy contentment, she scratched the beast in the ribs, drawing a vibrating rumble-bumble that bounced her head up and down, sending little ripples of laughter exploding through her. After a while the tars yawned widely and stretched out, belly up, so she could rub his stomach. He yawned again, rumbled with deep pleasure, and waved his feet in the air as she dug her fingers through the shaggy fur running down the center of his stomach. She turned her head and stared into a gaping red cavern ringed with bone-white horrendous fangs. Chuckling, she batted him in the jaw with the back of her hand. “Close your mouth, Daimon, before you scare me to death.”

  A tug on the fishline brought her head around. Sliding over to the edge of the rock, she peered into the water. Another fish was nibbling at the worm. As she tucked straying ends of hair behind her ears, the fish darted forward and struck at the hook. “Ah! This one’s yours, Daimon, love.” She played the fish for a moment, then tricked it out of the water.

  When she had the hook free, she tossed the fish to the tars. He whipped up his head and caught it. With a fast double crunch, it disappeared and he dropped back into a lazy pool of black fur.

  Later, as Horli slid down the arch of the sky and high heat waned, Aleytys sat up on the bunk and yawned. Although every door and window in the cabin stood open, the air was thick and hot so that she felt sticky with sweat and her head ached dully from a too-heavy sleep. Sighing, she rubbed her eyes and brushed damp strings of hair off her forehead. “I’m going to have to stop sleeping so much,” she muttered. “I should be doing my exercises, doing more riding, or I’ll end up in the same shape as when I started.” She sighed again and swung her legs over the edge of the bunk.

  A scrabbling sound at the door shot adrenaline through her heavy body, sending her leaping for the far window. A triangular black head thrust through the doorway and rumbled in a kind of tentative question.

  “Daimon.” She padded over to him. “You almost scared me white-haired.” She stopped in front of him, hands on hips. “You never came in the house before, mi-muklis. Now what could you want, I wonder.”

  Treading warily, the tars slipped around her, the tips of his retracted claws clicking daintily on the plank floor. He came up behind her and butted his head against her legs. She stumbled forward a few steps, nearly falling to her knees. He butted against her again, moving her a few steps farther toward the door.

  “Hai, what …” She heard the deep rumble he made when he was pleased about something. She reached around and put her hand on his wide head. “Wait a minute, abru sat. I don’t grow my own fur like you.” She pointed to the peg where her abba was hanging. “I’ve had enough sun on my skin today.” She scratched behind his ears, then edged quickly past him. The tars grunted but let her go.

  As she wrapped the abba around her and tied the fastenings, she frowned thoughtfully at him. “Animal? Just what else are you, my handsome friend?” She smoothed the material down over her body. “Haia, let’s go.”

  He led her into the forest on a winding, twisting path through the thickets of sinaubar, wild plum, and badmaha, around the huge ironwoods, past daunting tangles of prickle-bush and raushani, unto she was thoroughly lost in the dim green twilight. She watched with envy as he moved gracefully through malicious natural obstacles that seemed to take delight in making her feel stumble-footed and moronic. Thorny vines caught at her abba, wrapped around her ankles, thrust claws into her hair while a small cut over her left eye opened by a snagging creeper itched furiously. She was sweating profusely, her eyes were watering, her nose running. It was a humbling experience.

  Every few strides the tars would turn around to make sure she was still following and his mouth would open in what she would swear was a grin. But the intense need to know, which was one of the driving forces in her own life, she shared with him. Totally dissimilar from the tars in body and habit, she found this strange likeness made them friends in a way no human had ever been with her. In her loneliness Aleytys sometimes wondered if she were fooling herself, creating something that was not there to save her sanity; but then would come that mind-touch, the warm sharing partnership, and her questions would vanish.

  The tars turned across the path in front of her. She unhooked the last creeper and looked around. Behind a fringe of raushani a wall of gray-green-amber stone rose up and up until it lost itself in
the canopy of leaves. She used the end of her sleeve to wipe the sweat and dust from her face and settled on an ironwood root, leaning back against the trunk, rather glad for the rest.

  The tars wiggled his ears at her and rumbled pleasantly. Then he slipped like a black shadow into the tall ferns and grasses between the clumps of raushani. Still intensely curious, she kept a tendril of her mind in touch with him, following him into the cliff. She chuckled, sensing the mewling kits in the blackness of the lair. Just for this moment she was completely happy. He brought me to see his family, she thought. Sliding the hood back, she let the breeze blow through her hair, contentment flowing like a warm river through her tired body.

  After a short wait the tars came back. He stood impatiently in front of her, ears twitching, body switching from side to side, while she scrambled to her feet and smoothed the abba over her body. She could have sworn he was anxious for her to present her best appearance. He gave a satisfied purring sound, turned, looked back over his shoulder, then walked away a few steps. Aleytys took a tentative step forward and his purr deepened with approval. Aleytys followed him through the bracken into a slit in the rock.

  Since the ceiling barely cleared the tars’s head she walked along stooped over uncomfortably until the crack widened into a bubble-shaped cavern. Light filtered in through a few smaller cracks penetrating the roof from outside. In the dim twilight Aleytys could see a female tars lying on her side with three minute bundles of fur nuzzling at her nipples. The female growled and Daimon walked over to her. He cuffed her lightly.

  Aleytys chuckled. “They’re very nice babies, Daimon. I can see why you’re proud of them.” She put approval warm in her voice. “I’m delighted that you brought me to meet your family, abruya ’haivna.” She went on rambling, putting approval and appreciation into the words, reinforcing this with the mind-touch. She knelt on the cave floor for about a half hour, telling the two tarsha about herself, talking just to be talking. Somehow it helped to say these things, although the listeners wouldn’t—couldn’t—understand. Big Daimon lay next to his mate, yawning now and then, licking her face and biting lovingly at her neck.