Zell’a Cree pulled on the door, but it was barred inside, as he’d expected. He backed up, looked at the building from outside. The old warehouse had two high windows that were barred. Ssaz was already at the bars, tugging on them. But the batlike creature didn’t have the strength in his hands to pull the bars loose.
“We could pry open the door,” one of the Tekkar suggested, breathing down Zell’a Cree’s neck. The Tekkar’s voice was annoyingly loud to Zell’a Cree’s sensitive ears.
“We don’t know if they’re in there,” Zell’a Cree said. “They may have left another way. Besides, if they remained within, they may have accomplices. I can smell several people who have entered here recently.”
He nodded toward the Tekkar. “Each of you circle the building, checking for other doors. If you catch the woman’s scent there, call us. Do not try to fight this woman alone. I will go up on the roof and listen for them, see if I can hear them inside.”
He only hoped that the Tekkar would follow his orders. The Tekkar had been bred for life on a violent world, and were prone to viciousness. Both of the men were likely to kill their prey without notice. And given their skill in battle, their blinding speed, the woman would not stand a chance against them.
Zell’a Cree’s ancestors were designed for life on a world where the air hung so heavy it would choke humans, and the gravity would make the blood pool in a human’s legs till the vessels burst. It was a dark world, swathed in eternal mists, and so Zell’a Cree’s ancestors had been gifted by the Immortals with compensations—eyes that could see in the dark, a sense of smell as keen as a wolf’s, hearing as sharp as an owl’s.
Zell’a Cree looked more human than any of his companions, but even now, the sensitive hairs in his ears twitched, and he listened for the sounds of voices.
“Ssaz, fly up and make certain that our prey does not leave the building,” Zell’a Cree whispered. “Ewod, you hide in the shadows and watch this door. I’ll try to find them inside.”
The scout unfurled his wings and leapt into the air, swooping down and then flapping madly. Zell’a Cree grasped the rough stone walls of the building with his fingertips, finding chinks in the stone with his fingers and toes, then climbed up quickly two stories to the roof, crawling over the moss-covered slate tiles, listening, trying to catch a scent.
In moments his knees were wet and bore cuts from the slate roof, but he hardly noticed, he was so intent. Several times he heard the sounds of rats in the rooms below him, their shrieking voices and feet padding over the wooden floors, but Zell’a Cree passed them by, straining to hear above the softly gusting wind, until at last he heard voices echoing in a room beneath him, and he stopped.
The night was nearly silent, and the humans below him, with their dull senses, were utterly unaware. “… The Inhuman will not hold harmless those who have slain its members.” A girl was speaking, or a young woman, more likely. He imagined that it was the swordswoman speaking. She had a commanding voice, which was at the same time soft and mellifluous. “We must flee at dawn.”
“Are you sure you want to come with us?” a young man asked. “It will be a long trip, and if I’m to protect you, it seems to me that the best way to do that is to leave you here.”
“I need to come,” the young woman replied. “Many servants of the Inhuman respect the Tharrin. You will need their help in finding the Harvester. You’ll get that easier with me around. Besides, we requested a Lord Protector simply because I can no longer trust anyone here. The number of those who have been converted by the Inhuman is growing. I would not count myself safer here than in your presence.”
“What of the giant, Rougaire? He seems trustworthy.”
The woman lowered her voice, and by this Zell’a Cree guessed that the giant must still be in the building, and the woman did not want him to hear her words. “Trustworthy, yes, but he is not your match as a warrior. In battle he is both as graceful and as dangerous as a dancing elephant. Still, he has a great heart. But if we are to win through to Moree, we will require stealth, and Rougaire lacks that capacity.”
“And will the Bock be coming?”
“No,” the Tharrin said. “He’s ill-suited to travel and is incapable of defending himself in an attack.” She hesitated. “And what of you? You say the High Judge sent you here. How did you earn her trust?”
“Maggie and I killed the Lords of the Swarm, and Maggie banished the dronon from the human worlds.”
There was a pause, and Zell’a Cree sat openmouthed at his good fortune. To find a Tharrin and the new human Lords of the Swarm both at once—it was incredible. “You did that?” the Tharrin asked.
“Aye,” the young man said, and his voice was weary. As if to change the subject, he said, “You said the servants of the Inhuman will be hunting us. Will they attack tonight?”
“That is doubtful,” the Tharrin said. “Maggie killed several of them, so they will respect her for that. And now she has reinforcements, while the hosts of the Inhuman are scattered in their hunting packs. No, I think it more likely that they will band in larger numbers—then try to hunt her down. That should give us time to escape.”
“How can we manage to escape them undetected?”
“Our best hope is to travel quickly, over water,” the Tharrin said. “The scouts have keen noses, but they are blind in the daytime. We can flee at dawn, but we cannot leave our scent on any road leaving town. With luck, they will search the buildings here in town for a couple of days before they realize that we are gone. I think we should leave in the morning, on the first ship that sails with the tide.”
Another feminine voice broke in, a young woman, “Gallen, the beds are made up.…”
Zell’a Cree inched away from the room, taking immeasurable care not to make a sound. The rainwater trapped in the moss had wet his tunic so that he shivered with the cold, but when he was well away from his prey, he merely turned on his back and looked up at the stars and three small golden moons that whirled dreamily through the sky like juggler’s balls. He breathed the sharp air, and considered. A Tharrin, a Lord Protector with his woman—the newly proclaimed Lords of the Swarm—all heading toward Moree to do battle with the Inhuman.
What better converts could he desire?
Zell’a Cree thought furiously, considering his resources. Here on the frontier he had nearly run out of his copies of the Word. And Zell’a Cree wondered if even the vicious Tekkar would be a match for a Lord Protector. Here, Zell’a Cree lacked the necessary resources for a confrontation, both in technology and in manpower. But if the humans were heading toward Moree …
“When you reach the Harvester’s throne,” Zell’a Cree whispered, “you will bow before it.”
* * *
Chapter 14
Once they reached the shadowed recesses of the warehouse, the Bock was dismayed at the sight of blood on Orick’s brow, so while Ceravanne and Gallen talked in the other room and Maggie and the giant made up beds nearby, the Bock lit an oil lamp and set it on some crates. Then it brought forth a pouch of blue dust from its belt, and began slowly rubbing it into Orick’s wounds, his sticklike finger probing tenderly.
“I see blood,” the Bock exclaimed, “but your hair is so dense, I cannot find a wound.”
Orick wasn’t sure if he should tell the creature that he healed quickly—ever since Maggie had fed him some capsules of nanodocs that would extend his life for a millennium or more.
“What is that?” Maggie asked of the powder, looking up from one of the bedrolls. “Healing Earth,” the Bock said. “It will ease the swelling, mend the cuts. It is a small wound. He should be well in a few hours.” Maggie came and pinched some of the dirt in her fingers. “Where does it come from?”
“Legend says that ages ago, the Immortal Lords brought it from the City of Life and put it in the land. Now it is there for the benefit of all people, to be used in curing all wounds.”
“Nanodocs,” Maggie whispered, looking at the powder. “Does it extend one’s
life? Regenerate nerve tissue?”
“No,” the Bock said, leaning away from Orick. “Only the Immortals in the City of Life have that power. But it cures wounds, mends bones. If you travel, you will find the Healing Earth in many places, beside the springs where the ground is wet.”
Maggie nodded thoughtfully, then said, “I’m going to let Gallen know that the beds are ready.” She went back behind the crates, into the main room. The Bock stood perfectly motionless, slightly hunched, and there was a vacant look in its eyes.
“Are you all right?” Orick asked.
“Pardon me,” the Bock said. “I fell asleep. I’m exhausted. I must rest soon.” The Bock stepped back into a corner, raised his arms up toward a dim window, and stood with eyes squinted, unfocused.
The Bock began asking questions, in his slow way, about Orick’s habits, his interests in theology and the possibility of becoming a priest. And with each question, the Bock grew steadily more incredulous, more awake and more interested.
The Bock asked, “So you have been working with Gallen for three years, yet never has he paid you? If you receive no compensation, why do you stay with him?”
“Oh, Gallen does buy me an odd meal now and then, but there’s more in this world than money,” Orick said. “After all, the Bible says that it’s easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. I’d have to be a wretched creature, indeed, to base my relationship with someone on money.”
“So why do you work with him?” the Bock said, his brown eyes gazing steadily at Orick.
“He’s my friend.”
“So you remain with him for companionship?” the Bock said, as if it were an alien concept, vaguely understood. “Of course.”
“But what of your own kind? Why do you not seek out other bears for companionship?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Orick grumbled, not wanting to admit the painful truth. But he was an honest bear, so he continued. “On my world, bears don’t run together. Mostly the males eat too much, and they wouldn’t want to share food with me. The females love to have us during mating season, but they commence snarling soon afterward, and then, well, they just won’t have you around, and they let you know it.”
“Have you sought company with many females?” the Bock asked.
“Some,” Orick admitted. “There was one I met just before I came here. I had hopes for her.”
“You wanted to bond with her?”
Orick hesitated to admit to such a crazy notion. “Marriage is an honorable and holy state … or at least that’s what the Bible says.”
The Bock stopped, and in the dim lamplight he opened his mouth wide in surprise, as if he had just had a fantastic idea. “You are human, Orick!” the Bock said excitedly.
“I’m a bear!” Orick argued.
“Few of us are what we seem,” the Bock said. “Our flesh is our disguise, hiding our desires and notions. Many who seem human are mere shells, so why should it be improbable that a creature such as yourself, who inhabits the form of a bear, would be a human at heart? Your thoughts, your beliefs and needs, are all those that a human would understand and agree with. And if you are human at heart, then by our law I have the right to extend the invitation: you may live within our society and enjoy the blessings of human company.”
“Great,” Orick murmured. He’d had human companionship for his whole life. It didn’t seem a great privilege. “So what does that get me?”
“A great deal,” the Bock answered. “Few nonhumans may ever enter the City of Life and obtain the blessings granted there. You will find many nonhumans here in the port, but they cannot travel the roads beyond. Instead, they must leave with their ships, returning to exile in Babel.”
The Bock seemed so distressed by the plight of the nonhumans that Orick found himself sympathizing with them. He imagined how things must be in Babel, a seething madhouse of incompatible species, preying upon the weak and upon one another, a vast continent laid waste by perpetual warfare. Orick’s heart went out to such creatures, for he understood what it was to be outcast, to never belong.
“So,” Orick grumbled. “Gallen will be surprised when I tell him that I’m as human as he is.”
“Are you sure that he is human?” the Bock said.
“Why, what else would he be?” Orick asked.
“He could be many things,” the Bock said. “I have not yet determined whether he is human, and so I cannot grant him the privileges that come with humanity.”
“Why, that’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard!” Orick said.
“One’s flesh is often a disguise,” the Bock countered. “On your home world, did you not often meet others whose thoughts and actions seemed strange to you—so strange as to be incomprehensible?”
Orick considered the blackguards who had tried to frame Gallen. Orick couldn’t quite understand how someone would go to so much work to destroy another. It just wasn’t in his nature, and on that count, Orick had to agree. Outwardly, men looked the same, but on the insides they could be strangers.
Maggie, Gallen, Ceravanne, and the giant Rougaire came back at that moment, and Orick said in glee, “Did you hear that, Gallen? The Bock says I’m human!”
“Well”—Gallen shrugged—”I’ve always known you were a better man than me, Orick, but I wish you would do something about that excess body hair.”
Orick chuckled, but Ceravanne said quite seriously, as if she were offended, “Do not take the Bock’s word lightly, Orick. For five hundred years, this one has been a Lord Judge in the City of Life. A million times he has judged the subspecies of peoples who came before him. In many ways, this Bock knows you better than you know yourselves. If he has proclaimed you human, then he is granting you legal rights and protections. This is a great boon, though you may not know it.”
“Well, thank you, then,” Orick said to the Bock.
Ceravanne turned to the Bock and said softly, “You know a human when you meet it. So, what do you think of Gallen O’Day?”
The Bock blinked and looked at her from the comers of his eyes.
“I approved the bear, Orick, as human. Not Gallen. As for Maggie, I cannot make a determination, since I have spoken with her so little,” the Bock admitted.
“And why do you not think that Gallen is human?” Ceravanne pushed him.
“I sense within him … a struggle. He desires to become more than what he is.”
“So perhaps he is only a human with high aspirations?” Ceravanne countered.
“Perhaps,” the Bock agreed. “I suspect that his are a strong-willed people, with only minor genetic upgrades, very close to feral humans in temperament. I could name him human,” the Bock said, “but I am loath to place him so low on the scale of sentient life.”
Ceravanne laughed daintily and half lowered her eyes, as if at a private joke. “I suspect you are right,” she said to the Bock. “To be a Lord Protector, one would have to be more than human.” She lowered the flame on the lamp, then with the giant in tow made her way to the other room.
Orick lay tasting the scent of cobwebs and thinking of the spiders spinning their webs above his head. He was unable to sleep for a long time.
The next morning, Orick woke to the cries of gulls and the smell of sea fog, a salty tang that seeped through every crack in the floor boards and clung to every fold of the blankets. Rougaire the giant had roused the others, and they grabbed their belongings then made a quick breakfast of bread and cheese from Ceravanne’s pack.
Gallen and Maggie sat alone and talked for a moment by the door with the giant, while Ceravanne had gone to the back room with the Bock.
Orick went to tell them that breakfast was ready, and what he saw surprised him: Ceravanne and the Bock stood in the dim light shining through a small window, and Ceravanne was holding the Bock’s long fingers, looking down at them, like a shy lover.
Orick stopped in the shadows of a crate, and the Bock said, “Are you sure you wa
nt to go with them? They killed so easily last night.”
“I too am horrified by their violence, but what can I do?” Ceravanne asked.
The Bock thought a moment. “For three hundred years you have studied with the Bock, learning the ways of peace. You are more one of us than you are of them.”
“Three hundred years.…” Ceravanne echoed. “It is time I return to my people, and teach them the ways of peace. If I can.” Orick wondered at the words “my people.” Was she saying that the nonhumans of Babel were her people?
“We are our bodies,” the Bock said. “I fear that you cannot teach peace to these creatures. And I fear that the violence you must endure in their presence will maim you. Should that happen, do not hesitate to seek us out. In the woods, in the high mountain glens, you can find peace with the Bock.”
Ceravanne had been holding the Bock’s hand, and suddenly she bent forward and kissed it. “Three hundred years among the Bock—passed all too quickly … I often wish to see the world as you do. I often wish that I could be you.”
Suddenly the Bock’s face twisted into a mask of profound regret, and he reached out his long fingers to stroke her hair, cradle her head in his hand. “We are our bodies, with all their hopes and dreams, all their limitations. But you, Ceravanne, even among the Tharrin—you are special.…” The Bock wailed in its own tongue, “Assuah n sentavah, avhala mehall—” and Ceravanne stepped back as if astonished at this.
“I love you, too,” Ceravanne said. “As much as I have ever loved.”
The Bock reached up to its head and fumbled among the green leaves at its crown, then plucked something loose and held it out for Ceravanne. It looked like a small greenish-tan nut, something that Orick hadn’t noticed before among its foliage.
“You are going away, and I may never see you again. Should you need a Bock, plant this seed, and in time I will be with you once again.”
Beyond the Gate (The Golden Queen) (Volume 2) Page 17