by V. B. Larson
Manstein’s eyes followed hers to the General’s retreating back. “Right you are,” he said, rising up from his crouched position behind the barricade. He dusted off his pants as the others stood with him. “He’s running out on us. Remember that crash that killed the last governor that the Nexus sent out? I recall Steinbach getting promoted from Colonel to General right after that.”
“Well, let’s demote him this time,” suggested another man, waving his pistol at the ceiling.
Manstein raised his big hands, quelling their urge to chase the General down. “Let’s have a vote right now.”
That got their attention. The tape of the failed assassination tape ended and Droad’s ID shots came up, proving his claim to the governor’s seat. The simple silver star and black background, the seal of the Nexus, glittered under his serious face.
“Our new governor has gotten himself in a jam. If we join him, we could be killed by those personal armies out in the Slipape Counties, or even the militia themselves. This could even mean civil war. So the question is, do we play it safe and slink home like the General, or do we stand by the Nexus?”
There was a brief moment of hesitation, but only a brief one. Unanimously, they voted to join Governor Droad.
When Sarah and Bili came floating down into the horkwoods, Sarah had at first been crazy with worry that Bili would be hurt. After finally extricating themselves from their harnesses and finding one another in the deep shade beneath the green canopy, she began to feel despair. They had lost everything.
“We can’t let them catch us, Bili,” she told her boy, gathering their survival kits from their crash-seats and heading uphill, deeper into the forests.
“I know. If they put you in jail, Mudface and Daddy will kill you now for sure,” Bili finished for her gloomily.
“We have to head away from the wreck. If we go deeper into the mountains, we might get away from the search lifters,” she told him. Silently, she added to herself the fact that going uphill should take them farther from the landsharks which infested the wet valleys of this region.
“I hope they blast that other pirate,” said Bili darkly. “I hope he goes down with his ship, too.”
Sarah said nothing. She couldn’t approve of her son’s wishing someone dead, but she felt the same way herself. Blind chance had reached out and dealt her family another bad hand. Bad luck seemed to follow the Engstroms. It seemed to shadow their lives. Right after they had gotten married, her husband Daniel had lost an eye in a pressure accident. The injury hadn’t kept him from working, but had put his commercial piloting days behind him. She had gotten pregnant soon after the accident, and although she loved Bili more than anything in the world, he had not made life any easier. When they had finally gotten things together and seemed to be making some headway, the second accident had come. With her husband dead and her son injured, finding the credit to make ends meet had become a daily struggle. Now, here they were in the cold mountains of Grunstein with nothing, chased by the law and soon the criminals as well.
With an effort, she pushed aside such depressing thoughts and tried to come up with an escape plan. It was Bili, however, who gave them the direction they needed.
“Mom, look over there,” he said, pointing into the forest.
Following his gesture, Sarah frowned at a path cut into the trees. Perhaps a dozen of the great trees in a row seemed to be down, their thick trunks lying like tumbled matchsticks. They stepped closer, cautiously.
“Looks like they just went down today,” said Bili, looking up and down an open alleyway in the forest that had been cut by some mysterious force. A ruler-straight clearing had been slashed through the trees. Murky light fell down upon the dank recesses of the forest, touching plants that had perhaps not been struck by such radiation in centuries. Examining the scene more closely, they could see that the trees had indeed been recently knocked down. The leaves of the giant horkwoods were still green and fresh-looking. The exposed dirt craters around their roots were fresh wounds in the black ground, like the bleeding gums of pulled teeth.
“I know what it is!” said Bili out loud, and at the same moment Sarah knew too.
“The other ship dropped its payload,” she said, finishing Bili’s sentence for him. She understood it all now, the other smuggler had dropped his goods out as soon as he came out of the Yeti. This made the fact that he had jumped out so early more reasonable. After a slanting fall of perhaps ten miles or more, the payload had landed here, cutting a swath through the forest and probably burying itself in the hillside.
She was just considering the idea of pilfering the payload, and the counter idea that someone would soon be along to pick it up, when she thought she heard a sound. It was more of a vibration really, beneath her feet.
With a premonition of great fear, Sarah grabbed Bili by the shoulders before he could step out under the open sky. She hunkered down with him, hiding in the undergrowth. Bili glanced over his shoulder at her as if she was crazy, but at the look in her eyes he was silent. Together they watched the strange clearing closely; breathing through their open mouths so their nostrils would make no whistling noises.
Then, just as Sarah was beginning to think she had gone mad, there was another sound. It was an odd, scraping sound, muffled somewhat as if someone didn’t want to be overheard. The scraping sound continued for a time, then stopped. Hardly daring to breathe, Sarah pulled the pistol out of her survival kit with fantastic care.
As she thumbed off the safety, making a tiny click, a new sound erupted. It was the sound of dirt being tossed about. It grew in intensity, and suddenly a large creature nosed its way out of the ground at the far end of the clearing. Together, Sarah and Bili put their hands to their mouths to stifle an involuntary scream. The creature was huge and hideous. With a streamlined snout and a rippled, leathery surface, it swam through the black forest dirt like a fish in water. Dozens of curved claws protruded from its walrus-shaped body. As they watched these claws scooped and churned at the dirt, tossing a hail of debris behind the monster. In essence it swam through the dirt, tearing and splashing through the ground like thick black liquid. Heavy clods with green crusts sailed about the clearing.
It churned around in a circle, showing itself to be over thirty feet in length and perhaps eight feet thick. Then the gigantic walrus-like monster finally dove back into the ground, disappearing from sight. Sarah and Bili took this opportunity to run from the scene, back into the cool gloom of the forest.
What kept them running a long time, despite their great fatigue, was the certainty that the creature they had seen was not natural to Garm. The Engstroms were nothing if not well-traveled, and they had never encountered or even heard of such a monster before. Nowhere in the great forests of Grunstein, nor down south in the steamy jungles of Amazonia and New Chad, nor even on the remote archipelago of the skalds did such a creature exist.
Sarah and Bili emerged from the horkwoods as evening fell. They had reached a small jax-raising farm outside of Hofstetten. After negotiating the electrified landshark fences, they met up with a boy about Bili’s age.
“Hi, I’m Jimmy Herkart,” he said, as if this was enough to explain anything and everything to two total strangers.
Bili did most of the talking. In an act of diplomacy far beyond his years, he gave his father’s spacers watch to Jimmy. They approached the farmhouse and safety with only occasional glances back to the dark edge of the forest.
Nine
Garth took another sip of his hork-berry spritzer. The red liquid cooled his parched throat.
“You look like you could use some sleep, skald,” said the barkeep, a man with reddish-bronze skin. He had immense hairy arms and a bald head. His speech revealed the lilting accent of New Amazonia. “I’ve got a few cots in the back if you’ve got the credits. Be an honor to have you.”
Garth shook his head, not meeting the man’s eyes. The ice in his drink tinkled as he set down the glass.
“All right, but you look l
ike you’re going to drive right into a ravine if you keep going.”
Garth took up his drink again. His hands shook. He was a rogue now; he had shunned his rider two days ago. Sleep was unthinkable.
As he finished his drink and coded a tip into the barkeep’s account, another skald came into the tavern. A wave of greenhouse heat and humidity gusted in the open door with her. The fetid smells of the jungle outside eluded the thrumming air conditioners for a time.
Garth sensed her before he turned, feeling the increased agitation of Fryx. The rider, trapped in the skull of a rogue, desperately wanted to communicate with another of its kind. Garth screwed up his eyes and bared his teeth as nerves flared with red pain. Garth knew that Fryx would never kill or seriously damage his host, but he could freely use pain as a goad.
The skald stepped up to the bar and took a stool beside him. Garth turned away, pulling the wide-brimmed hat he had bought lower over his forehead.
“You’re the one,” said the skald quietly. Her voice was soft and melodious. “You’re the one my rider brought me here to find.”
Garth whirled. His sweating face and haunted, sunken eyes leered at her. “I want solitude.”
The woman was tall and thin in the way of the skalds. Her long limp hair hung to her waist. It was white and very fine. “No skald can ever have that,” she said with a slow shake of her head.
Garth grabbed up his drink and tossed it down. He sucked up a sphere of ice and rattled it about against teeth. With the relish of a man recently come from the desert he chewed it and swallowed. The cold explosion in his mouth helped ease the agony up higher in his head.
The skald’s eyes widened as she watched him. “You’re so-so uncontrolled, so unreserved-” suddenly, she gasped in understanding. “You’re a rogue.”
Garth grinned at her, his eyes doing a wild fluttering roll before refocusing on her face. He removed his hat with an almost drunken flourish. “Yes, meet Garth the rogue, pretty one.”
She drew back, aghast and fascinated. “I am Kris and I bear Tuux. What is your rider’s name? I see by the mounting stripe on your face that you bear a great rider.”
“My rider’s identity is unimportant,” slurred Garth. His shoulders rolled and his fingers writhed seemingly of their own accord. “What is significant,” he hissed out in agony, “is that he plays on my nerves like a player plucking at a harp just now. I must ask you to leave me, he seems bent on torturing me in your presence.”
“He wants only to communicate with another rider, I’m sure. Let Tuux contact him,” she pleaded. She placed her hand on his. “He must feel so alone, so isolated. Your conduct is most disrespectful.”
“No,” Garth hissed, pulling back from her touch as he would the fanged mouth of a leaf serpent. The skin of his hand burned and tingled. Standing, he reeled toward the exit.
“If the militia pull you over, don’t tell them you came from here,” shouted the barkeep, shaking his head.
Kris quietly followed him, biting her lip.
Garth drove the lurching ground vehicle further into the jungles of New Amazonia. He passed by several settlements on the way, ignoring the reclusive inhabitants who gaped at him as they did all outsiders. Beneath the dark green canopy of the tropical hork-trees fantastic creatures hooted, howled, trumpeted and screeched. Howlers dented his vehicle with heavy seedpods. Leaf serpents dropped into the roadway, attacking the car in the belief that they were defending their territory. Garth crushed the seedpods and the serpents with equal disregard, his overriding concern being the need to stay awake.
Over a hundred miles out from the settlement where he had met Kris and rested, a large vehicle normally used for hauling timber approached from behind. The stabbing sensations in his mind let him know instantly that Fryx sensed the nearness of another rider. He had been expecting this, clearly Kris and Tuux had gathered what help they could to hunt him down.
He shoved the power rod upward, braking sharply. The car shuddered, became difficult to control. Stabilizers whined in protest. He swerved off the road and into the undergrowth. The car bucked and lurched, steering became almost impossible. Fighting the controls, he managed to guide the car into a narrow gully. Fronds lashed the car, probing into the broken windshield like green fingers.
Out of the greenery stepped a monster. Standing erect, directly in front of him, stood a male bald jungle ape of terrific size. In panic, he swerved the car wildly and hit the rocky wall of the gully. The front end crushed inward and he was ejected into the leafy undergrowth. Inside his head Fryx screamed in mortal terror.
Stunned, he lay on a bed of moss. A trickle of water dribbled over his back from somewhere high above in the forest canopy. Whining insects crawled on his skin and tasted his sweat. Out on the road the hauler stopped where he had entered the jungle and there was the sound of heavy boots on the pavement. Men shouted to one another as they entered the forest to pursue him. He shifted his head a fraction, but could see no sign of the jungle ape.
“He’s back here somewhere, see the path he’s carved through the jungle?”
Shouts came from his pursuers as they followed his trail and found the mouth of the gully. Garth remained prone, fearing the dark form of the jungle ape more than any group of men. Men might be reasoned with.
“Over here!” cried the melodious voice of Kris. “I’ve found the car. It appears to be wrecked.”
The men appeared now on the fringe of Garth’s vision. They were strong-looking men of the forest, not the thin pallid forms of skalds. Two held rifles while the third toted a hand-cannon. Soon the man with the hand-cannon, seemingly the leader, discovered Garth where he lay in the undergrowth.
“Is this the man who raped you?” he demanded, prodding Garth’s inert form with the barrel of his hand-cannon.
Garth listened with only half an ear. He thought to see the flickering of a dark shape along the edge of the gully.
“Well-he,” began Kris in a troubled voice. Garth knew that she battled against her rider to tell the truth. “He needs help.”
“Come now, girl,” said the man with the hand-cannon. “You can’t be soft with him now.”
Even as they spoke, Garth felt a huge soft shadow fall over them. He cringed involuntarily, unable to play dead any longer.
“Hey, he’s waking up-” began the leader, then broke off into a hoarse shout of surprise. Incoherent shouting erupted from all of them. A heavy wash of foul air swept over Garth.
He glanced over his shoulder to see the leader being lifted up into the trees in a great black fist. His jungle boots dangled, dribbling moist earth. The hand-cannon barked twice, then there was a crunching sound. The body dropped down into the undergrowth beside Garth, flopping unnaturally like a crushed doll.
Running back toward the road, the other men fired their rifles in panic. Garth had to fight an overwhelming urge to join them in their flight. His rider helped him lay still; sending soothing, numbing sensations down his spine to his legs.
The men were caught up in massive fists and borne aloft into the red hork treetops. The incredibly thick trunks shuddered and swayed with the passage of a huge shadowy form. The foliage thrashed and branches snapped. A single heavy grunt sounded from far above.
Silence reigned over the jungle for several minutes. Not even the most brazen of the cackle-grouse dared to cry out. During this entire time, Garth continued to lay supine on the moss-bed, trying to ignore the stream of marcher-bugs that had decided to use his back as a shortcut.
“Is it gone?” came a whisper.
Garth shifted his head a fraction in surprise. His eyes slid upward as far as they could and he made out the pallid bare feet of Kris only a few feet away across the jungle floor. She too, lay motionless, feigning death.
“It watches us,” he whispered back. “It’s somewhere above, crouching in the treetops.”
Both of them were silent for a time, listening to the wild sounds of the jungle. Evening was coming and the howlers were beginning t
heir twilight serenade. Talking became more feasible with the covering cacophony of sound.
“I’m sorry to have led these men to chase you. It seemed so imperative that I told them anything to gain their aid.”
“Now you have gained only their deaths and perhaps ours as well,” replied Garth, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice.
“Tuux and I apologize to you and Fryx.”
Garth’s lips curled back in disgust. “It was Tuux that coerced you into following me. I accept nothing from any of his kind.”
“You are indeed a rogue.”
“Yes,” replied Garth, blinking back exhaustion. “For so long as I can remain awake.”
They were both silent for a time, listening for movement in the distant treetops. The light that filtered down to the jungle floor dwindled somewhat with the approach of nightfall, but the heat continued, relentless.
Suddenly, something occurred to Garth. He half-turned to face Kris before checking himself. He noted that she was only partially covered by her torn clothing and quite attractive, even in her disheveled state. “How did you know I carry Fryx?” he demanded.
“The greatness of your stripe,” Kris said with the tiniest of shrugs.
“No, no,” he said, laying his head back down in the moss. “Many riders are as large. You reported me back to the greatest of the skalds, back in their shrines. From my description and whereabouts they identified me. I have no doubt that you told the Jarl himself.”
Kris made no attempt to answer.
“Soon, they will hunt for me, and due to your proximity, they will expunge you as well. Consorting with a rogue can be infectious. We will both be handled roughly.”
Kris, knowing the truth of his words, wept quietly for a time.
Garth chided himself not to soften. He refused to even look at her. Lying on the jungle floor, listening to the howlers and feeling the steady tread of the marcher-bugs, Garth slid helplessly into the oblivion of sleep for the first time in days.