“Of course,” the bruin said. “Didn't you?”
“No, I—”
The tainted bear-man did not wait for Jask to finish his reply. “I knew, when the talent first came to me — gradually at first, then with more power — that I wouldn't always be able to conceal it.” He wiped a huge hand across his wrinkled, dark face, pushing at his blunt nose and snuffling as if to clear his head and think more soundly. “The talent becomes second nature to you. It would be just as easy — or difficult, rather — to hide the fact that you had two legs or eyes.'' Satisfied that the rucksack had gone unmolested, he stood up and stretched. “Besides, the power's like — a compulsion, a need. I tried to ignore it, because I knew it could ruin me, make me an outcast. But I learned it would never go away and that I couldn't suppress it. When it's not used, it sort of builds up, a heavy pressure inside — and then it manifests itself when you're not expecting it.”
“I know,” Jask said, sadly. He looked at the rucksack again and said, “Why did you hide your provisions here, in a warehouse?”
“It's my warehouse,” the bruin said. “Or — it was. I doubt they'll permit me to go on with my business.” He laughed sardonically. “If they hadn't come upon me by surprise, I. would have been gone six hours later.”
“Where will you go, though?” Jask asked.
“I've already said.”
“No one can survive the Wildlands,” Jask said. “Nature isn't in charge there. She's been put out by the Ruiner.”
“No theology, please,” the bruin said. “We have to pack your supplies, and quickly. I don't imagine it will take them long to break in here on the off chance that we—''
“You expect me to go into the Wildlands?” Jask said, incredulous.
The bruin rooted industriously through a few nearby baskets, found a small, gray cloth sack, emptied its contents onto the floor and handed it to Jask. “I'll choose the stuff that goes in it,” he said. “Come along, now.”
Jask followed down the aisle and into another one, numbed but able to speak. He cleared his throat and said, “I am not going to go with you.”
Casually the bear-man tore open another crate, which proved to be packed full of paper-wrapped lengths of dried, salted meat, the ends of the packages tied with larded string. He lifted out handfuls of this and put it in the sack Jask held. “This gets to be pretty damn boring as a regular diet, but at least it's nourishing.”
“Look,” Jask said, “I can't possibly—”
The bruin waddled off to another batch of containers, opened several baskets and poked around in them, came up with half a dozen pieces of fresh fruit, dropped those into the Pure's sack. “Now, let's see… a few tools… certainly a knife…”
Jask dropped the sack.
“What's this?” the mutant asked.
“Forget it. I'm staying here.”
“They'll have you in less than an hour.”
“Nevertheless, I stay.”
The bruin bent, picked up the sack and handed it to him again, saying, “You're coming along, so get used to the idea.”
Jask dropped the sack again. He was shaking so badly that his teeth rattled in the still of the storage chamber. “No.”
This time the tainted creature did not pick up the sack, but he picked up Jask instead, gripped him by the collar of his cloak and hoisted him off the floor, so that they were eye-to-eye. He peeled his black lips away from his teeth and grinned that Satanic grin of his. His dark tongue licked the points of all those white teeth, as if he were anticipating the first bite. When he spoke, his voice was like a carefully controlled peal of thunder, all the force of his big lungs behind it. “Either you come with me, little man, or you die here, now.”
Jask sputtered but could not find any words. He had begun to think he should never have resisted the death sentence that had been passed on him the day before, in the enclave court.
“I can't afford to leave you behind for those others to pick apart. You know I have a pack, well provisioned, and that I intend to set out across the Wildlands. When I reach the other side, I don't want to find that those Pure friends of yours have radioed others of their sort on the other shore. It would make the trek seem wasted.”
“You'll never make it anyway,'' Jask said. “You'll die in the Wildlands. Therefore, everything else is academic.”
The bruin's breath was not especially pleasant, and he let Jask have a strong whiff of it, square in the face. “One thing you've forgotten, though. It will take me the better part of the day to reach the Wildlands. If I leave you here, you'll have spilled everything long before then. I'll be caught before I enter the forbidden lands.”
“I promise not to tell them,'' Jask said, swinging gently from the creature's clenched fist.
The bruin spoke with undisguised anger and disgust, his eyes squinted beneath the heavy, bony brow. “You? Hell, you'll squeal like a pinned pig, tell them everything they want to know. You'll break in ten minutes, you puny little bigot.”
Then he opened his hand and let go of the Pure.
Jask fell in a heap at the tainted creature's broad, flat feet.
“Get up, now.”
Jask got up, hating the big mutant but hating himself more. He rubbed his thin arms and wished that he did have a bit more muscle, enough to deal with the mutant.
Five minutes later they had packed the sack and were ready to leave the warehouse.
Jask said, “Where do you intend to go if you ever manage to get out of the Wildlands? No matter where you settle down, you'll be rediscovered. Your talent will flare up, unexpectedly. Or you'll use it too often to gain things you want and end up giving yourself away.”
“I intend to find the Black Presence,” the bruin said. “And once I've done that, I'll have no need to live anywhere on this world.”
For a moment Jask was speechless. When he could find his voice, he said, “Foolishness! There is no Black Presence. Do you sincerely believe in all those silly myths about other worlds, that man once traveled to the stars and is still being watched by an — an alien who's waiting to judge him?”
“Why not?” the bruin asked. “It's history, not myth.”
Jask grimaced, for he had realized that the bruin's world view was even more heretical, more unorthodox, then he had at first understood. “Then you must also believe that the Last War was fought between two different groups of men — instead of between man and the Ruiner, who had come to undo Lady Nature's work?”
The bear-man laughed aloud. “My friend, the Ruiner you fear so much is only a myth. It is you who must relearn history, the true history of this sorry world.”
“Heresy,” Jask said, apalled.
“No, nothing of the sort. It is merely the truth,” the bruin said. “But all of this can wait until we're free of that pack of dogs baying at our heels. Let's go.”
At the opposite end of the great chamber into which they had clambered from the sewer the bruin lifted away another stone slab, revealing a second drain. “It's only a different branch of the same system,'' he said. “This way, there's less likelihood of encountering those bastards hunting us.” He dropped his heavy rucksack through, went in after it, looked up at Jask, who stood trembling at the edge of the entrance. “I could be out of this hole and on top of you before you had a chance to run very far,” he growled.
Jask nodded despairingly, dropped his smaller sack, and entered the drain after it.
The bruin put the stone shield in place.
He said, “Come on, then. We have quite an arduous journey ahead of us, my friend.”
Jask followed in the mutant's tracks, the fungus-coated walls close, the water splashing under foot, the odor almost overwhelming him. He was behind the creature, and he had a knife: two interesting facts that jelled into one crisp, violent notion in his mind. He should be able to kill it. Yet he knew that if he had the skill and strength to jam the blade into the bruin's back, he would find himself half-strangled in those brawny hands before he had time to twist it.
“You're perfectly correct, friend,” the bruin muttered. “And unless you place that blade in one of two vulnerable spots, I'd hardly notice the pain.”
