Beholder's Eye

by Julie E. Czerneda

  "It's the largest orchard in the valley," Ansky answered in a shaken voice, perhaps feeling her own dismay.

  No doubt the orchard was large. By the light of the rising moons I could see its ranks of fruit trees marching to the start of the mountain forest and down again to surround this entire side of the village.

  But the feathery tips of the tallest of those young trees would barely reach my chin. Most would be under my elbows.

  "We don't have a choice, Fems," Ragem said bluntly, hurrying from where he walked back a few paces to check on our pursuers. "They're coming. Enough of them to cause trouble, at any rate." His arms swept both of us forward through the orchard gate. "Let's not make it any easier."

  * * *

  Out There

  DEATH made up a new game. It slipped from shell to shell, exploring their differences, relishing the sense of life so vulnerable and close, imagining the result of cracking open this one here, or that one there.

  Such fun.

  The possibilities of pleasure were so great, Death almost forgot where it wanted to go and why.

  Almost.

  * * *

  41: Orchard Night; Forest Night

  « ^ »

  I WAS soon convinced this would be one of those nights I'd replay in my thoughts for centuries to come, forced to remember each painful moment with the acute and vivid accuracy of my heritage. I envied Ragem his fallible Human memory. If we could trade, the first thing I'd choose to forget was running for my life as a Ket through this Artican orchard.

  I was young, strong, and healthy. I was also working under several disadvantages. The orchard was carpeted, not in turf, but in a spiked, curling, detestable undergrowth Ansky-memory told me helped discourage small wild herbivores. It was discouraging me; with every step my bare feet translated each tiny thorn's grip-and-release as a needle through my skin. To make me even more miserable, Artos' gravity, while close to Ket-norm, was sufficiently greater to steal whatever excess energy sheer terror lent me.

  In a final insult, the warm caressing air had turned chill (to a Ket) and thin, due to the late evening slide of air down the mountain. I gasped, shivered, stumbled, and otherwise made a miserable show of keeping up with Ragem's tireless strides and Ansky's ponderous grace.

  I'd have given anything to cycle out of this form.

  But, thanks to my web-kin's inspired selection of escape routes, there was no hope of doing that without being seen. I couldn't keep up if I crouched below the tops of the tiny trees. And I wouldn't cycle in sight of the pack climbing steadily behind us. There may have been only three Articans giving chase, but they were three witnesses too many.

  Ersh, I hope you appreciate this, I grumbled to myself, yanking my foot free of a more amorous clump of foliage than most, surely leaving skin behind in the bargain.

  "How far up?" Ragem's panting had a reassuringly desperate quality.

  "To the tree line," Ansky's voice floated back, still as calm as though we were engaged in evening revels instead of running for our lives. "We'll split up there—confuse them a bit—then meet back at the inn when things quiet down."

  She continued to plow ahead, aiming at the knife's edge of shadows marking the verge of the natural forest. From Ansky's memories, I knew it to be an old, overgrown, and wild community, filled with a labyrinth of game trails only a hunter used to this area could safely travel. Surely some of those behind us qualified. Likely Ansky did. Ragem didn't.

  My toes snagged again and this time I allowed myself to stop, breathing in the light quick pants that delivered air to my lungs in the Ket equivalent of the Human's heaving gasps as he halted beside me. "What's wrong?" he asked in a whisper, looking behind us at those now gaining with every step.

  "Ansky," I called quietly, almost shaking with an anger deeper than anything I'd ever felt before. My birth-mother, my web-kin, turned to look at me, her face in the moons' light showing little more than impatience before she stepped farther into the protection of the shadows.

  "This is no place to rest, youngest," she chided. "Safety lies ahead."

  "Not for Ragem," I disagreed, knowing what she planned. I dared her to admit that once separated in the forest, she intended the two of us to cycle and escape, leaving Ragem to fend for himself. It was classic web-thinking. Skalet would approve, though doubtless be surprised to find it coming from the usually less than rational Ansky.

  I wouldn't allow it.

  It wasn't easy making out details on a face half-concealed by the shadow of the trees, but I thought I saw a glint on her cheek—a tear, perhaps. "Individual survival is not one of the First Rules, youngest," Ansky reminded me in her soft, kind voice. I gripped my hoobit tightly, not needing a lecture on rules I'd already broken, not that Ansky would know. Keeping the secrets of the Web seemed highly unimportant at the moment, though I had little chance of convincing Ansky before the Articans reached us.

  "We go together," I insisted. "We can lose them."

  "We separate. The Clepf River flows from the forest and crosses through the village beside the inn. Follow its banks and keep to cover. You'll both be fine."

  A stronger breeze than most rushed through the great branches of the trees ahead, softening to a mere fluttering of leaves as it met the tiny legions of the orchard, as if careful not to harm anything so small and helpless. I couldn't bring myself to take another step after Ansky, even when she made an exasperated sound and turned to go. Ragem hesitated with me.

  "What's wrong, Es?" he whispered. "I agree with Ansky—we're safer out of sight. And you can cycle there."

  "And what will you do, Human?" I asked. "How will you avoid them?"

  Ragem looked over his shoulders at the three Articans climbing toward us. They'd ceased their shouts and curses, perhaps finding the pace Ansky set as difficult as I had. But there was no sign they planned to stop. "I grew up on a world much like this. I know how to make my way through the bush," he assured me. "I'll meet you at the inn. Don't worry."

  "I'm not leaving you—" I began to argue. Just then, Ansky came back, perhaps to urge us into the forest. Instead, she froze at my side, looking down the slope at the Articans as they moved through the shoulder-high trees like swimmers through waves.

  "Iterold?" she breathed. Then, regrettably at the full extent of her formidable lung capacity: "Iterold!" The word tumbled down the mountainside before echoing from the other side of the valley. So much for stealth, I thought glumly.

  One of the figures slowed, raising his head to look up. he was too far for my Ket eyes to see clearly, but Ansky didn't have that problem. "Dear God," she said. "It is him."

  I didn't know the name, but I knew that tone from Ansky. This must be one of the partners Ersh had filtered from Ansky-memory for me. "Let's go," I said, my turn to urge my web-kin toward safety.

  The face she turned to me was wild-eyed and confused. "You don't understand, youngest. We've known each other for years. Iterold taught me how to cook spedinni—among other things. He must be trying to help me. We must wait for him." This was the Ansky Skalet worried about, I thought, with good reason.

  "No, Ansky—" I protested.

  "You want me to trust this Human," she countered with the accuracy of desperation. "I tell you, we can trust Iterold!"

  Regem added his voice to mine, saying urgently: "They're carrying weapons, Ansky. I'm sorry, but we can't trust any Artican tonight."

  "No. You don't—" She broke off and actually began to run back down the hill. It took both of us to stop her, a feat we barely managed.

  "For Ersh's sake, Ansky!" I shouted in her ear, my toes digging into the soil as I tried to keep her in place. An avalanche was right. "Have some sense! If this Iterold loves you, what do you think he's going to do about the penance? Refuse to send you to his heaven? He's your worst enemy now."

  Finally, Ansky listened. I could tell because Ragem and I lurched forward in comic unison, clinging to her for support as she gave up the effort to push past us. "Iterold?" she whispered,
still looking over my shoulder. I didn't bother. Footsteps and heavy breathing were all the clues I needed as to what this delay had cost us.

  "The forest. Now!"

  Somehow the three of us scrambled out of the revealing moons' light into the shelter of the trees and brush before our pursuers caught up. Ansky, either now convinced or so grief-stricken she was beyond argument, didn't suggest we separate but led the way up a narrow trail I barely saw in the almost stygian darkness. I kept both hands outstretched—certain I was going to collide with a branch or Ansky's broad back at any moment, if I didn't trip over my long feet first. Ragem brought up the rear.

  Where were they? The silence behind us seemed ominous. I knew the Articans wouldn't give up the chase, not when they had come so close. They could know this trail well enough to move more quietly than we did.

  Or they could know another way to go—a way that would cut us off. I suggested as much to Ansky when she slowed to duck under a partially fallen tree.

  "There's no other path," she said shortly. "Watch your head."

  I turned to pass on this advice to Ragem, only to find he wasn't there. "Paul-Human," I hissed as loudly as I dared, hearts pounding. "Paul—!"

  "Here." His voice materialized before he did, proof if I needed any that his woodcraft was superior to mine. In this form, I thought wistfully to myself. "Just checking on our friends back there. No sign of them." He sounded as worried as I felt. I thought he was also wondering why Ansky and I hadn't cycled into something capable of escaping. I couldn't imagine how Ansky would react if I told her she was risking her life to keep our secret from the one non-Web being who knew almost everything about us.

  I could force the issue, I thought, pursing my lips in a frown, and would if Ragem were in danger or if we had no other options. But given that Ansky's hard-won identity on this world had collapsed, at least two of her current loves were much less than happy, and I'd brought her news of our murdered kin, it hardly seemed the right time to force her from the security of Ersh's Rules.

  Besides, I reminded myself with certainly misplaced amusement, that kind of thing took practice.

  By my estimation, we reached the point at which I expected to meet Ansky's guiding river at about the same time I noticed our path was now a dry streambed. Given my state of near-exhaustion, I appreciated the soothing distraction of the cool, rounded rock. The lack of signs of pursuit was less comforting. Where were they?

  "Hold up," Ragem said from behind me.

  I could make out the pale oval of Ansky's face as she turned to find out what he wanted. It was significantly lighter here, more of the moons' brightness reaching the forest floor as the trees began thinning out. "What is it?" she asked. "We're almost to the Clepf."

  "I thought I heard something."

  "There's wildlife—" Ansky stopped and I strained to hear what the others were listening to over the pounding of my hearts. Amazing how the body responded to new levels of fear, I thought, feeling my Ketself definitely ready to run.

  Crash! The sound of the tree falling beside the path was loud enough, especially when it followed the thwomp of an explosion. A Denebian mid-range grenade, Skalet-memory provided unhelpfully. There was shouting from behind even as branches continued to slide and crack their way to the ground, one narrowly missing us.

  "Cycle!" I hissed to Ansky, grabbing at her shoulder. "Now!"

  "No!" she exclaimed in horror. "The Human!" She tried to pull free, but my Ket grip held through my lighter body moved with her. "We must leave him first."

  "He knows—" I tried to explain, but my voice was drowned out by another explosion, close enough to spray us with gravel and debris. I froze, still holding Ansky, locked in Ket-panic and a frustrated need for my Elder to make a decision.

  Ragem didn't hesitate an instant. His shoulder struck me just above my hips in a violent tackle that drove both Ansky and me forward to the streambed. The scream of ripped wood overlapped a closer, more intimate cry of pain. Both sounds died into silence.

  "Ragem!" I cried out, struggling to free myself from the tight grip of his arms—no, I discovered with horror, not his arms, but the branches of the tree that had fallen on us all.

  I exploded into web-form, immediately sensing Ansky's perfection moving away. She was safe. Ragem. I tasted his organics among the dying molecules of the tree floating past my surface. Too concentrated. He must be bleeding. Not dead. I could feel the impulses driving his heart, running through his nerves. And suddenly, with a force I registered as pain, a new rhythm burst through my senses, played in resonances that said machine, a signal blasting past me, past this atmosphere, and doubtless much farther than I could follow.

  Ragem's implant had activated.

  I didn't care what this meant about Kearn or his plots.

  What mattered was that the device detected Ragem's vital signs going critical. Ersh, was he dying?

  Being surrounded by mass made my choice simpler. I assimilated tree molecules, changing them into more of me with frantic haste, then cycled…

  Having dozens of eyes certainly helped make the most of the dim light, but I'd chosen the Carasian form for its other attribute—the brute strength of its handling arms. I used my new claws to snip and tear away branches, clearing my view of the main trunk. Ragem wasn't under it.

  Voices. I compressed myself into as small a space as I could among the ruined wood, hoping the Articans would miss my black leaf-bedecked mass among the shadows, even closing the upper and lower valves of my head to hide any reflection from my eyes.

  The sounds of searching came closer and closer, then began to fade again into distance. Ansky, I thought, suddenly torn between duties.

  A nearby moan settled my priorities. The Carasian form was a pitiful climber, its spongy footpads and bulky body adapted nicely for existence on rocky tidal flats, but somehow I forced myself through the tangle of limbs on top of the tree trunk and climbed down the other side. I went as carefully as possible, afraid of landing on Ragem if any of the thinner branches gave way under my weight.

  "Ragem?" I called softly, hoping he accepted the change in vocal cords. "Paul?"

  Another moan, softer. There. I clipped and pulled until I could see the Human's body, motionless under a trio of thicker branches.

  The bulk of the tree had missed him. At first, I couldn't tell why he lay so still. Then, I saw the reason and shuddered so hard my armored skin rang like thunder. One narrow branch disappeared into his back, pinning him to the gravel bed. Another memory to haunt me forever.

  I made myself think of it as a test, something Ersh might have devised to assess my ingenuity. The body trapped so helplessly below me wasn't my dearest friend, it was only a problem to solve. As if I believed that, I whimpered to myself. Blood darkened most of his jacket, but mercifully no longer poured from the wound. The first thing was to free him without making matters worse.

  Clearing away the surrounding limbs was tricky. Some I had to leave so the massive tree trunk didn't roll over on us both, something it threatened each time a crack announced a branch farther along had broken under the strain. Well enough, I thought, and opened one large claw to encompass the piece of wood spearing Ragem's flesh. My other claw I'd worked underneath him and clamped around the protruding end where it entered the ground. At least I hoped that's what I felt. My two, smaller claws were fixed on his near leg and shoulder.

  Fast would be best.

  "Paul?" I said. "I'm going to free you now. Hold still if you can."

  There was no answer, which I hoped meant he was unconscious and wouldn't feel what I was about to do.

  I snapped both large claws shut, the most powerful muscles of this form driving their bladelike edges through the wood as though it was a rival's flesh. Simultaneously, I pulled Ragem toward me with my other claws, scrambling back as the trunk groaned and settled, punching the cut end of its branch into the pool of blood where Ragem had been a breath ago.

  "Too close," I commented to the being cradled
in my arms, trying not to shake him as I continued to back away.

  "Ansky?" the faintest whisper caught my hearing, fortunately an organ located near my second elbow joint and so near Ragem's face.

  "You pushed us clear, Paul," I told him, only now recognizing what he'd done. "You'd better not die on me," I added, hunting and finding a likely spot. I didn't hear him answer as I gently laid him on his side in the soft moss.

  Then I stood and stared at him while checking our surroundings for any sign of the Articans, something easy to do with independently mobile eyes. We appeared to be alone.

  Ersh, what do I do now?

  The answer was as simple as it was unpleasant. To save Ragem, I needed the aircar to take him to the med on the Quartos Ank. To save Ansky, I again needed the aircar and the Kraal ship. "I have to leave, Paul," I said. The higher, soft pitch of my voice surprised me. At some point during my agonized decision-making, I'd slipped back into Ket, a terrifying thoughtlessness. Or perhaps instinct, I admitted, since this was the form I must use with the Kraal—though I found I no longer cared about the opinion of the Articans.

  I left Ragem, climbing much more easily as Ket through the wreckage of the tree to look for my things. My skirt had shredded beyond repair and my flower petal necklace was gone, but I found the hoobit, its leather thong broken but serviceable, the metal of the pendant itself blackened with soot. I tied it around my neck, rubbing at the dirt with already dirty fingers.

  Back to Ragem. I piled moss up against him for warmth, then used soil and finally small twigs to brace his body so he couldn't roll over and jar the ends of the branch protruding from his chest and back. It had missed his major organs by all the signs I could see, but was a serious injury nonetheless. His face was pale and beaded with sweat despite the cool night air. Shock, I fussed to myself. That and blood loss could kill him before the sun came up.