Rogue Queen

by L. Sprague De Camp

  “I don’t know…How many are there, Yaedh?”

  “If the whole band is here, over two hundred,” said the priestess.

  The arrows continued to fall.

  Bloch said: “Since they got our chariots I calculate I have between eighty and a hundred rounds for the rifle, plus twenty or thirty for Barbe’s pistol. With full-automatic fire you could shoot all that off in a matter of seconds, so we shall have to make every shot count. And you can see there are many more than I have cartridges.”

  It seemed to Iroedh that Bloch was trying to think up excuses for not getting any closer to the rogues. Antis persisted:

  “If you killed a few, the rest would run. I’ll go with you with my matselh—”

  Yaedh gave a little shriek and a gasp. Iroedh, her shield slung across her back for protection, crept over to where the priestess lay with an arrow through her ribs. Yaedh sighed:

  “If I could only have had a real love again in my life…”

  Her head lolled. Iroedh said:

  “She’s dead, poor thing. Daktablak, I agree with Antis that there’s no point in lying here the rest of the night under this arrow rain.”

  “Well?” said Bloch.

  “I doubt if they have organized a tight circle around us yet. If we gathered up what we absolutely need and moved quietly we might burst through their line without their knowing it.”

  “I don’t know—” said Bloch.

  “She has reason,” said Barbe.

  “I hate to run away—” began Antis, but Barbe continued:

  “We can go away from the road, which is the direction they won’t expect, make a big semicircle and come back to the road several kilometers north of here, which should be near Ledhwid.”

  Arrows continued to fall.

  “All right,” said Bloch at last. “Everybody make a bundle of what he most needs. I suppose Barbe and I shall have to walk ahead with the guns, so you two Avtini will have to carry all the gear—”

  “No,” said Antis. “If you shoot those things the noise will tell the others what’s happened. You carry the gear; Iroedh and I will walk ahead and—” He made a slashing motion.

  Iroedh, fumbling in the dark, found she had comparatively few possessions. The only thing she really regretted was the biscuit flour, without which she foresaw a hungry time. She put her belongings into her cloak and tied the corners together as Antis was doing.

  “Ready, everybody?” said Bloch. “Proceed quietly now!”

  Crouching low and feeling their way along in single file, they issued from the remains of the baggage barricade and headed away from the road.

  VIII. Royal Jelly

  Antis led the way, shield before him and machete ready. Iroedh followed, looking over his shoulder. Behind them arrows continued to fall upon the deserted camp. Around them the creeping things kept up their symphony of night noises, and in the distance the rogues could be heard talking and moving.

  They walked away from the road up the hill. Iroedh could hear the heavy breathing of the Terrans behind her; considering their loads it was not surprising.

  Antis turned his head and made a tiny hiss. Iroedh crouched lower and moved more cautiously, fingering the hilt of her weapon.

  A voice spoke in front of them: “Who is—”

  As the dark shape materialized before them, Antis bounded forward and struck. Iroedh sprang after him, at an angle to bring her beside him, and swung too. She felt her blade bite into the unseen target.

  The dark shape collapsed. When Bloch arrived, gun ready, the rogue lay dead.

  “Come on,” murmured Antis.

  They went over the crest of the hill and down the other side. Here the trees began again, so they had to move with creeping slowness to avoid entanglement.

  Bloch said: “Antis, can you see your way? How do you know you’re not conducting us in a circle?”

  “I don’t know. I try to keep the sounds of the drones behind us.”

  “Suppose,” said Bloch, “we open out to where I can barely perceive you. I’ll sight on the girls and tell you whether you are bearing to one side or the other.”

  They tried this system, but without much success, because under the trees the darkness was too profound to see more than a few meters. After a while they adopted a more complicated scheme in which Bloch stood squinting through his infrared viewer while the others went ahead of him, obeying his instructions, and then they in turn stood still until he caught up with them. Where the brush was heavy Iroedh or Antis would go ahead to cut a way with a machete, all others staying well clear of the blade. Iroedh soon learned that her bronze replica of the implement did not hold an edge nearly so well as the steel original. In fact, after a couple of hours it was not much more effective than beating at the bushes with a bludgeon.

  They were still struggling wearily ahead when the cloud canopy over the treetops lightened. Iroedh could never remember having been more tired; the tasks of a Community, while sometimes strenuous, were so organized as not to push the workers to exhaustion.

  In the gray dawn they straggled out of the trees where a hillside rose in a bank of bare rock ledges. They climbed up these, ledge by ledge, until they were nearly at the top, then sat down to rest with their feet dangling.

  Bloch said: “Have we anything to eat?”

  Antis untied the corners of his cloak. “Of that stuff we brought from the chariots last night, only three containers were not opened. I brought them along, I think they’re that soft oily meat you eat.”

  He held up three cans of tuna fish.

  Barbe said: “How about the poor Iroedh?”

  Bloch shrugged. “If she wants to take a chance on Terran fish, okay. Otherwise—Is there no wild food in these woods?”

  He opened one of the cans. Antis said:

  “You can’t easily live off this country. If I had your gun and knew how to use it, I might kill an occasional beast; but for her I don’t know what there is.”

  “I’ve been looking,” said Iroedh, “and the few edible berries and seeds found around Elham don’t seem to grow this far north. No, I won’t have any tunafyth, thank you. If we can get back to the road I’m sure I can hold out till we reach Ledhwid.”

  “If we can find the road again,” said Barbe. “Winston, get out your map and compass.”

  Bloch got the map from his knapsack and unfolded it, then began hunting for his compass. He went through the knapsack, then through his pockets, his face registering deeper and deeper dismay.

  “I’m sure I have it,” he muttered.

  Antis said: “That little round shiny thing you were looking at last night when you consulted the map? You laid it on the ground; perhaps you forgot to pick it up again.”

  Bloch went through everything again, then exclaimed: “That tears it! Barbe, why didn’t you remind me? It’s your business to see I don’t forget things—”

  “It is not! The last time I reminded you of such a thing you shut me up.” Barbe turned to Iroedh. “It is a curious feature of Terran culture that when the men do something of a stupidity they always blame their wives.”

  “Huh,” said Bloch. “Now we are in a predicament. If we had the sun I could tell north by my watch, and if we had the radio I could erect a directional loop and ascertain the direction of the Paris. As it is I haven’t the faintest idea where we are or which way to proceed.”

  Iroedh said: “You have the map, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, but look at it!” He held it up. “It’s a strip map of the route from Gliid to Ledhwid, made from a series of aerial photographs by Kang. All it shows is roads, streams, and a couple of Communities; the rest is forest. And since there aren’t any signposts to tell us where we are on the map, all I know is we’re somewhere to the east of the main road.”

  Antis said: “If we found a stream we could follow it down, don’t you think?”

  “Look!” said Barbe sharply.

  Across the valley they faced, figures had appeared on the crest of t
he opposite hill. They were scattered over a wide front and popped in and out of sight as they moved through the vegetation. Although they were too far for features to be discerned, Iroedh saw that they carried spears.

  Antis said: “Let’s run for it.”

  “No!” said Bloch. “Sit absolutely still. If we don’t move they may not observe us.”

  They sat frozen while the first group of drones disappeared into the heavier cover of the lower slope and more came into view on the crest.

  Barbe said: “At this rate the first ones will have come up to us before the last ones have come over the hilltop.”

  “Oh!” said Iroedh. “I think they see us.”

  There was a scurry of motion among the approaching drones, with much shouting and pointing. Those in sight broke into a run.

  Bloch groaned. “Off we go! Don’t cut any brush, Antis; it’ll give them a trail to follow.”

  They got to their feet and scrambled up the slope and into the woods again.

  “I wonder,” panted Barbe, “how they—found us—this time?”

  Antis answered: “They do much hunting—and some—are expert trackers. And we did—cut a lot—of brush.”

  Iroedh saved her breath for hiking, feeling weak from lack of food. They ran when the terrain permitted, otherwise walked as fast as they could. On and on, without any particular attention to direction. Sometimes Bloch led, sometimes Antis. Anything to put distance between themselves and the band.

  Iroedh discarded her helmet and buckler (obtained from the dead drones the previous day) to the annoyance of Antis, who, during his sojourn with Umwys, seemed to have become a connoisseur of arms and armor, and hence resented having to give up a good piece.

  At last Barbe said: “It must that I—stop for a minute.”

  As they stood panting, the hallooing of the pursuit came faintly. Off they went again.

  Bloch said: “Yaedh was correct; that Wythias lusts after these guns in the worst way.”

  “Naturally,” said Antis. “He could rule the planet with them.”

  “Not without ammunition, but perhaps he doesn’t know that. Can you go now, Barbe?”

  On and on. To Iroedh the flight became a nightmare of running, walking, climbing over logs and rocks, stumbling, falling down, getting up again, and stumbling on some more. All day they hiked, and most of the night.

  In the afternoon of the next day they came to a stream. Bloch said:

  “If we wade up or down this we may throw them off our trail.”

  They splashed along the stream bed for half a borb until the stream began to curve around in the direction from which they had come. Bloch, leading, turned his head back to say:

  “I think we should take the woods again—Wup!”

  His legs had suddenly sunk into the stream bed up to the knees, and the rest of him seemed to be following.

  “Quicksand!” he yelled. “Somebody shove me a pole!” He peeled off his knapsack and threw it ashore. “Barbe, catch the gun!”

  Iroedh was so exhausted that she could only stand and stare stupidly while Antis stumbled ashore and began looking for a sapling to cut. It seemed, however, that all the trees in this section were old forest giants. While Antis was still searching, Barbe got down on hands and knees and crawled out over the sand of the bottom toward where Bloch was already in up to his waist.

  “Catch this!” she said, swinging her jacket toward him, holding it by one sleeve. After a couple of tries he caught it.

  Iroedh pulled herself together and hurried to grasp Barbe’s ankles to keep her from going in too. Little by little, holding first the jacket and then Barbe’s hand, Bloch wallowed shoreward. By the time Antis showed up with a pole Bloch was safe, and a few seconds later was sitting on a rock digging the mud out of his ears while Barbe kissed him and told him how wonderful he was.

  Iroedh, though she listened, could hear no sounds of pursuit. Bloch said:

  “We may have eluded them. If we can find another pool further down, we might get cleaned up a little before taking to the woods again.”

  They continued on down, avoiding the quicksand, and soon came to another pool in which they removed the mud from their clothes and persons. Iroedh noted that the curious exposure tabu of the Terrans seemed to be in abeyance, or perhaps it did not apply to mated persons. One Terran stood guard while the other washed. Iroedh stared at them with frank physiological interest, noting resemblances and differences between man and Avtin and speculating about their significance. As the resemblances outweighed the differences, she guessed that biological fundamentals must be much the same in the two species.

  Then off into the woods they went again. By nightfall they agreed that they had probably lost their pursuers. The only trouble was that they had also lost themselves in the process, even more thoroughly than before.

  “If we could only get some sun,” said Bloch, “we could hike north a few borbi, then west again, and pick up the road in a couple of days…Oh-oh, rain!”

  A pattering on the leaves overhead made itself heard. Bloch asked:

  “How long is a rain likely to last hereabouts?”

  Antis shrugged. “Perhaps an hour, perhaps three or four days.”

  “Everything happens to us,” said Bloch. “All we need now is for one of your noags to try to devour us.”

  “Don’t say that!” said Antis. “There are those who believe that saying such a thing makes it come true. Besides, in these northern woods the noags grow to much greater size than around Elham.”

  “Anyway, we might bestir ourselves to construct a shelter,” said Bloch. “Iroedh, if you’ll cut some poles…”

  Iroedh tried to get to her feet, but to her consternation found she could not.

  “I can’t get up,” she said. “I’m too weak.”

  “Running all that distance on an empty stomach, it’s no wonder,” said Barbe.

  Bloch said: “Lend me your machete, then,” and went off with Antis. Iroedh could hear them blundering about and slashing, but was too far gone to care whether she acquired shelter from the rain or not.

  “This becomes serious, my little,” said Barbe. “Even if the rain stops it will take us two or three days to get back to the road, and how will you manage without food?”

  “I—I think I could get up now,” said Iroedh. “I shall be better when I’ve rested.”

  The shelter took gradual form, though so much water dripped through the greenery that served as a thatch that Iroedh found it but little improvement on no shelter. Bloch, Barbe, and Antis divided the remaining tuna. Not wishing to show a light, they forewent a fire and prepared to make the best of a dank and miserable night. Antis produced his telh and began tweedling, whereupon Bloch exclaimed:

  “Do you mean to say that when we were fleeing for our lives we were hauling that piece of junk?”

  Antis replied with hauteur: “Daktablak, I made no objections when you brought along your mouth furnace and a goodly supply of the weed you burn in it.”

  Bloch looked at his freshly lit pipe and changed the subject.

  The rain continued another day and another night, and yet another day and another night. Then it ceased as a brisk cool wind soughed through the treetops and blew away the cloud cover. Bloch hurried over to the first patch of sunlight, performed magical rites with his watch and a knife blade, and triumphantly announced:

  “That’s north! Let’s go!”

  Iroedh found that her two days’ rest had given her some strength to go on—at least for a time. But the going proved harder, for now that he knew his direction, Bloch insisted upon the party’s sticking close to it, even though it forced them to scramble over steep hogbacks and splash through black bogs where small creeping and flying things bit and stung, instead of following the line of least resistance as they had been doing. They marched all day, camped, and next day marched again.

  During the morning they climbed out of one swamp hole and up the face of a steep hill. Presently they surmounted a ledge
projecting from the side of the hill. Above the ledge the rock overhung to make a cave which, while shallow, was quite big enough to accommodate the four of them. By common consent they all sank down upon the ledge to rest. Antis, as usual, took advantage of the pause to whet his and Iroedh’s machetes, while Bloch swept the sky with his binoculars for a sight of Kang.

  Bloch, on whose lower face a growth of yellow-brown hair was sprouting, said: “This would have been a much more comfortable place to spend those two rainy days, but I suppose—What’s that?”

  An animal had come out of the woods: a bipedal herbivore like an ueg but bigger. It was peacefully breaking off the branches of trees with its hands and eating the leaves.

  Antis said: “That’s a pandre-eg, a wild relative of the ueg. Kill it, quickly!”

  “Is it dangerous?” whispered Barbe.

  “No, but I’m starved.”

  Bang! Iroedh leaped with fright. When the ringing in her ears subsided she saw that the pandre-eg had fallen to the ground, kicking and thrashing. Bloch leaped down the slope. As he neared the beast it stopped moving.

  “Dinner!” he called.

  The other three trooped down to where the animal lay. Bloch said:

  “I should like to save it as a specimen, of course, but I’m afraid—”

  “Oh, you!” said Barbe. “You’re as bad with your specimens as Antis with his armor.”

  “Can you butcher this thing, Antis?” said Bloch.

  “With pleasure. I learned how from Umwys. However, it will save time if you’ll lend me that knife of Terran metal. Oh, Iroedh!”

  “Yes?”

  “How does that hunter’s dance go when you wish to change your luck?”

  “You set a game animal’s head on a stake and dance naked eight times around it sunwise, facing backwards. If you fall down or see a khal tree it spoils it and you have to start over.”

  “There don’t seem to be any khal trees,” said Antis, “so take off your boots. We’re going to try it.”

  Antis began sawing on the beast’s neck while Iroedh unlaced her boots, finding that it took all her strength to do so. The prospect of dancing eight times around anything appalled her, especially as she doubted whether it would actually work. On the other hand, she was a little afraid of offending Antis.