“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 balls 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.
Ok so far”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 Centre. They had been exact and colourful, 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 centred 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, armour, 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.
3
Storm 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 rnakin’ 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 shoulders 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-grey 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 colour.
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
