by Andre Norton
“You put her on patrol too?”
“Yes. I don’t think any yoris can beat Surra. Saaaa—” He hissed the rallying call and Ho and Hing tumbled into the firelight, climbing over his legs to rear against his chest and pat him lovingly.
“What are they good for?” Ransford asked. “They wear pretty big claws, but they’re small to be fighters—”
Storm fondled the gray heads with their bandit masks of black about the alert eyes. “These were our saboteurs,” he replied. “They dig with those claws and uncover things other people would like to keep buried. Brought a lot of interesting trophies back to base, too. They’re born thieves, drag all sorts of loot to their dens. You can imagine what they did to delicate enemy installations in the field—”
Ransford whistled. “So that’s what happened when the power for those posts on Saltair failed and our boys were able to cut their way in! Say—you ought to take them up to the Sealed Caves. Maybe they could get you in there and you’d be able to claim the government reward—”
“Sealed Caves?” At the Center, Storm had learned what he could of Arzor, but this was something that had not appeared on the Emigrant Agency’s record tapes.
“They’re one of the tall tales of the mountains,” Ransford supplied. “You ought to hear Quade talk about them. He knows a lot about the Norbies, went through the drink-blood ceremony with one of their big chiefs. So they told him about the caves. Seems that either the Norbies were more civilized once—or else we weren’t the first off-worlders to find Arzor. The natives say there are cities, or what used to be cities, back in the mountains. And that the ‘old people’ who built them went inside these caves and walled up the doors behind them. The big brains down at Galwadi got excited about it one year—sent in some expeditions. But the water is scarce up there, and then the war blew up and stopped all that sort of thing. But they posted a reward for the fella who finds them. Forty full squares of land and four years import privileges free.” Ransford wriggled down into his blankets and pillowed his head on his saddle. “Dream about it, kid, while you’re riding herd circle.”
Storm deposited the meerkats on his own blanket roll where they crept under cover. Baku, one leg drawn up into her under-feathers in the bird of prey’s favorite sleeping position, was perched on the rim of the baggage cart. He knew that both the animals and the bird would remain quiet unless he summoned them to action.
The stallion that he had named Rain-On-Dust because of its markings was too untried for night herding. So the Terran pad-saddled a well-broken mount Larkin had assigned him as second string. He rode into the dark without any uneasiness. For the past years the night had provided him with a protective shield too many times for him to worry now.
Storm was close to the end of his tour of guard duty when he caught Surra’s silent alarm—that swift mind flicker, cutting as keenly as her claws. There was trouble shaping to the northeast. But what—or who—?
He turned his mount in that direction, to hear a squall of cat rage. Surra was giving tongue in open warning now, and Storm caught an answering shout from the camp. He snatched his night beam from the loops on his belt, flashed it on full strength ahead of him, and caught in its path a glimpse of a serpentine scaled head poised to strike. A yoris!
The horse under him plunged, fought against his control, screaming in terror as the musky scent of the giant lizard reached them and the harsh hissing of the yoris hurt their ears. Storm gave attention to his own coming battle, having little fear for Surra. The dune cat was a good and wary fighter, used to strange surprises on alien worlds.
But with all his skill Storm could not force the horse to approach the scaled menace. So he jumped free, into the taint of reptile reek, borne downwind, wafting on to the herd beyond, where hoofs pounded hard on the earth. The loose horses were stampeding.
That part of Storm’s mind that was not occupied with the action at hand, speculated on the oddity of this attack. From all accounts the yoris was a wary stalker, a clever wily hunter. Why had the creature headed in tonight with the wind to carry its scent ahead to frighten the meat it hungered for? There was no yoris hatched that could match speed with a panic-stricken horse, and the lizard had to depend upon a surprise attack to kill.
Now, cornered and furious, the scaled creature squatted back upon its haunches, its fearsomely taloned forelegs pumping like machine pistons in its efforts to seize Surra. If the enraged eight-foot reptile was brute strength at bay, the cat was fluid attack, teasing, tempting, always just a fraction out of reach. Storm whistled an urgent call to pierce the hissing of the lizard.
He did not have long to wait. Baku must already have been roused by the clamor. Though the night was not the eagle’s favorite hunting time, she came now to deliver the “kill” stroke of her breed. Talons, which were sickle-shaped, needle-sharp daggers, struck at scales while wings beat about the eyes of the yoris. The lizard flung up its head trying to snap at the eagle, exposing for just the needed instant the soft underthroat. Storm fired a full charge of his stun rod at that target. Meant to shock the nerves and render the victim momentarily unconscious, the impact of a full clip on the throat of the yoris was like the swift sure jerk of a hangman’s noose. It choked, beat the air with struggling forefeet, and collapsed.
Storm, knife in hand, leaped forward, moved by the battle reflexes drilled into him. Viscid blood spurted across his hand as he made certain that particular yoris would never hunt again.
Though the yoris was dead, it had lived long enough to bring the orderly herd close to disaster. Had the attack occurred when they were deeper into the wastes, Larkin would have had little chance of retrieving many of the horses. But, though the stampede carried the animals into the wilderness, the mounts were fresh off the space transports and not yet wholly acclimated, so the riders had hopes of rounding them up, though to do so they must now lose valuable days of travel time.
It was almost noon on the morning after the stampede that Larkin rode up to the supply wagon, his face gaunt, his eyes very tired.
“Dort!” He hailed the veteran who had come in just before him. “I’ve heard there’s a Norbie hunting camp down on the Talarp. Some of their trackers could give us twice as much range now.” He slid down from his overridden mount and stalked stiff-legged to the wagon to eat. “You talk finger-speech. Suppose you ride over and locate them. Tell the clan chief I’ll pay a stud out of the bunch for his help—or a couple of yearling mares.” He sighed and drank thirstily from the mug the cook handed him.
“How many did you boys bring in this morning?” he added.
Storm gestured toward the improvised corral they had thrown up to hold the strays as they were driven back.
“Seven. And maybe we’ll have to break a few of them for riding if the rest don’t find more of the regular stock. The few we have can’t take all this work—”
“I know!” Larkin snapped irritably. “You wouldn’t believe those four-footed idiots could run so fast and so far, would you?”
“I could—if they were deliberately driven.” The Terran awaited the results of that verbal bomb.
While both men stared at him, he continued. “That yoris attacked with the wind at its back—”
Dort Lancin expelled his breath in an affirmative grunt. “The kid’s got a point there, Put! You could almost believe that lizard wanted to mess us up like this.”
Larkin’s eyes were hard, his mouth a thin, unsmiling line. “If I believed that—!” His hand went to the grip of his stun rod.
Dort laughed angrily. “Who you goin’ to put to sleep, Put? If some guy planned this deal, he’s out there combing the breaks for strays right now, not standing around to wait for you to catch up with him. You’d never set eye on his trail—”
“No, but the Norbies could. Storm, you’re green and from off-world, but you’ve a head on your shoulders. You ride with Dort. If you find any more strays, pick ’em up. Maybe that educated cat of yours can hold ’em for you in some cutback. If there
was any funny stuff behind that yoris attack, I want a Norbie scout nosin’ around to uncover it.”
Surra could match the pace of the tired horses as they headed toward the distant river bottoms. And Baku rode the air currents above, a fourth and far-searching pair of eyes. By all rights the eagle should locate the native camp first. Storm knew that was true when the black wings spread in a glide and Baku perched on a rock outcrop, her dark plumage very visible against the red of the stone. Having so attracted the Terran’s attention, she took off again, leading them more to the southeast.
The horses, scenting water, quickened pace, winding through a thicket of pallid “puff” bushes where the cottony bolls of weird blossoms hung like fur muffs on the leafless branches. Surra, her coat hardly to be distinguished from the normal shade of the alien grass, trotted ahead, sending into the air in terrified leaps some of the odd rodent inhabitants of that limited world.
Dort suddenly drew rein, his hand flung up in warning, so that Storm obeyed his lead. Surra was belly flat and hidden in the grass and Baku came earthward, uttering a sharp, imperative call.
“I take it we’re sighted?” suggested Storm quietly.
“We are. But we won’t see a Norbie unless he wants it that way,” Dort returned. “Yaaaah—” he called, dropping his reins on the horse’s neck and raising his hands, palm out.
A physical peculiarity of Norbie throat structure prevented any vocal speech that could either be understood or imitated by the off-world settlers. But there was a well-developed form of communication and Dort employed it now. His fingers moved swiftly, though Storm could hardly separate the signs he made. But his message was understood, for a shadow detached itself from the trunk of a tree and stood out, giving Storm his first sight of a native apart from a tri-dee picture.
The Terran had pored over all the films concerning Arzor at the Center. They had been exact and colorful, meant to entice settlers to the frontier world. But there is a vast difference between even a cleverly focused and very lifelike tri-dee and the real thing.
This Norbie was tall by Terran standards, very close to seven feet, looming over Storm himself by close to a full twelve inches. And he was exceedingly lean for his height, with two arms, two legs, regular, even handsome humanoid features, a skin of reddish-yellow not far removed from the shade of Arzoran earth. But there was the one distinctive physical attribute that always centered off-world attention to the forehead at a first meeting between Norbie and alien visitor—the horns! Ivory white, they were about six inches long, curling up and back over the hairless dome of the skull.
Storm tried to keep his eyes from those horns, to concentrate instead on Dort’s flying fingers. He must learn finger-talk himself as soon as he could. Then, baffled, he turned his attention to the native’s dress and weapons.
A wide band of yoris hide was shaped into a corselet, which covered the Norbie’s trunk from armpit to crotch, split at the sides over the curve of the hip to allow free leg movement. The legs in turn were covered with high-legginged boots not unlike those worn as a protection against the thorn shrubs by the settlers. The corselet was doubled in thickness at the waist by another strip of scaled hide serving as a belt, supporting several pocket pouches decorated with designs made by small red, gold, and blue beads, and the ornamented sheath of a knife close to a sword in length, while in his six-digit hands the hunter carried a weapon Storm already knew. It was longer than any Terran bow he had seen, but it was a bow.
Dress, armor, and ornament were combined in one last article of apparel, a wide collar extending to shoulder point on either side, and almost to the waist in front, fashioned entirely of polished yoris fangs. If those had all been taken by this one Norbie, with only a bow and a knife as weapons, then the hunter would have to be respected in any company of fighting men in the galaxy!
Dort dropped his hands to his saddle horn as the native signed a reply. Then he stiffened as the Norbie set arrow shaft to bowstring with a speed that startled the Terran.
“Look out for your cat!”
Storm hissed Surra’s call. She arose out of the masking grass and came to him, the arrow trained upon her unrelentingly. Dort was trying frantic sign-talk. But Storm had his own method of reassurance. Swinging from the saddle pad, the Terran motioned and Surra moved closer, rubbing with feline affection against his legs. Storm went down on one knee and the cat set her forepaws on his shoulders, touching her nose lightly to his cheek.
CHAPTER THREE
S
torm heard a bird-trill and glanced up to meet the astonished yellow eyes of the Norbie, their vertical pupils expanding visibly. The native spoke again in his thin, sharp twitter, a surprising sound to come from the throat of that large body as his fingers flicked a question at Dort.
“Call in that eagle of yours, too, if you can, Storm. You’re makin’ a big impression and that can be good for us—”
The Terran scratched Surra under the jaw and behind the ears and then stood up. Spreading his feet a little apart and tensing his shoulder for the shock of Baku’s landing weight, he whistled.
Wide wings beat the air as Baku dropped in a series of spectacular turns. But when those powerful talons gripped Storm’s shoulder they did not pierce flesh. Under the merciless beams of the Arzor noon sun the blue-black plumage had a metallic sheen, and the patch of bright yellow feathers about the cruel blue-gray curve of the beak stood out as if freshly daubed with paint.
“Saaaa—” The Terran’s warning alerted both cat and bird. Feathered head and furred one moved to his signal, and two pairs of predatory, glittering eyes regarded the Norbie with intelligent interest.
“That’s done it!” Dort was relieved. “But keep ’em under control when we go into the camp.”
Storm nodded, staring at the spot where the native had stood only seconds earlier. The Terran prided himself on his own scoutcraft and ability to become a part of the landscape, but this Norbie was better than the best he had ever seen.
“Camp’s down on the river bank.” Dort came out of the saddle. “We walk in. Also—” He drew his stun rod from its holster and fired the ready charge into the air. “You don’t enter with a loaded rod, it’s not considered manners—”
Once more Storm followed the settler’s direction. Baku took off into the sky and Surra paced a yard or so before them, the tip of her tail twitching now and then to betray her interest in her surroundings. There was the scent of strange cooking and stranger living smells, as well as small sounds, coming up slope.
A Norbie camp was not pitched on formal lines. Lengths of kalma wood, easily shaped when wet and iron stiff when dried, had been bent by each householder to form the framework for a hemisphere tent. The hides stretched over that frame were piebald mixtures patched together from the fruits of the individual family’s hunting. Blues of frawn pelts were joined by clever lacing to the silver-yellow scales of young yoris skins, banded in turn with the red fur of river rodents. The largest tent had a complete border about its base and door flap of jewel-bright bird skins set in a pattern of vivid color.
Storm could see no women as they came down to the cluster of tents. But before each of the dwellings stood Norbie males, young and old, each armed. The scout who had met them on the trail was waiting at the flap of the bird-trimmed lodge.
As if unaware of the silent audience, the off-world men threaded their way to that tent and Dort halted before the chieftain. Storm stood quietly a little behind him, allowing none of his interest in his surroundings to show. Silently he counted some twenty of the rounded tents, and he knew that each housed a full family, which could number up to fifteen or more natives, since a man married into his wife’s clan and joined her family as a younger son until the number of his children increased to make him the head of his own family. Judging by Norbie standards this was a town of some size—of the zamle totem—for a stylized representation of that bird of prey was painted on the name shield before the chieftain’s lodge.
“Storm”—Dor
t spoke softly as his hand signed a greeting to the impassive natives—“call in that bird of yours again. These are—”
“Zamle clansmen,” the Terran nodded. “So they’ll be favorably impressed by my bird totem?” Again he whistled to summon Baku, bracing himself for the bird’s landing. But this time matters were not to go so smoothly. For, as the eagle came, she screamed a challenge in a way unlike her usual manner. And she did not come to Storm, but threw her body back, presenting her ready talons to the tent as if that hide and fur erection were an enemy.
Storm, startled, hurried forward. Baku had grounded now, walking across the open space before the Norbie chieftain in a crouch, her feathers standing up, wings trailing half open on either side of her black body. She was in a red rage, though the Terran could not see what had aroused her. That is—he did not, until a streak of living green burst from the tent in reply to the eagle’s scream of challenge. Luckily Storm got there first, catching Baku by the legs before she could strike at her attacker.
Screeching in a frenzy the eagle beat her wings, tried to turn her talons on her handler, while Storm exerted all his strength of shoulder and arm to keep her fast, striving at the same time to enforce his mental control as well as the grip of his hands. The Norbie chief had caught up his own feathered champion and was engaged in a similar battle until one of his clansmen flung a small net over the angry zamle. When the green bird had been bundled back into the tent and Baku had been calmed, Storm tossed her onto his riding pad, confining her with jesses so she could not leave that perch until he freed her.
Breathing hard he turned to find the Norbie chief beside him, intent on the eagle. The native’s fingers flew and Dort translated.
“Krotag wants to know if this bird is your totem.”
“It is.” Storm nodded, hoping that that gesture meant the same on Arzor as it had on Terra.
“Storm!” Dort’s excitement broke through the control he had kept on his voice. “Do you have a wound scar you can show in a hurry? Scars mean something here. That will prove you’re a warrior according to their standards—as well as a man with a real fightin’ totem. The chief may even accept you as an equal.”