The Sprites in the gallery scattered. 'Guess whatever was in there was pretty nasty,' said the Leewit. 'They've still got her though.'
'She was one of those calling for retribution, too,' said Hantis with satisfaction. 'The guard I sent to tell Arvin about Wellpo said that the High Lord had instructed the guards to search his quarters. I think they must have found something that incriminated her. I think that this is all over, even before those who would speak for us have their turn.'
'Vatch!' hissed Goth. 'Captain, get ready.'
Pausert began hastily shaping hooks of klatha force with his mind. And then realized that, unless Silver-eyes needed to be tickled, they wouldn't help.
Why didn't you catch the big one? it buzzed reproachfully. I took a big chance teasing it, Big Real Thing. It nearly caught me, too—and then you let it get away!
It was too quick for me, admitted the captain. And I can't get close enough to it now. It's watching us, but keeping its distance. I've been trying to figure out how to either go after it, or to get it to come closer.
The tiny vatch buzzed around, amusing itself by doing a quick light-shift and making the underside of the gallery where they stood transparent. Why don't you hide where we can't see? Then the big one might come looking. Though it might just go away, I suppose.
If the big vatch just went away they'd be stuck here in the past. But they had to try something.
There's a no-place right here, Big Real Thing. Where they make the stuff for the lights. The place where up spins. You could hide there.
'Where 'up spins'?' The captain assumed Silver-eyes was talking about some kind of power plant. He thought about it for a while.
The crowded galleries began cheering.
'What's going on out there?' asked the captain, irritated that his train of thought had been disturbed.
Hantis laughed. 'We've got a lot more adherents than Sprites who wish us ill—especially as the chief detractor turned out to be a paid spy and possible murderer. The fact that the Leewit is a child and was kidnapped upset a lot of Sprites. The mother of young Lisol and Ta'himmin has just finished speaking. She was very eloquent on your behalf, Captain. We Sprites are protective of our young. They'll be yelling for war now, when they find out the infected ones have fled to Delaron.'
'Huh. Child!' said the Leewit crossly. 'I think I'll whistle at 'em. Lisol and Ta'himmin are children. Me, I'm —'
'An impossible brat,' said the captain, with a smile. 'A pint-sized disaster-in-motion. Other terms come to mind.' He pressed on before the Leewit could do more than scowl. 'Now, if they'll let us out of here, I want to try getting out of historical Nartheby before you go and destroy any more its ancient heritage. Is there a power- generator room we can get to, Hantis?'
She nodded. 'But you will have to wait until High Lord Arvin rises from the Seat of Judgment. While this matter will, I think, be speedily settled, I believe there is a second item on the slate. A question of property. We Sprites believe in finders' keepers and there is a belief among a small party that you have expropriated their property, Captain. Property that they found, and should be entitled to keep.'
'What's that?' asked Pausert warily, feeling in his pockets.
'Their pet,' said Hantis, with a perfectly straight face. 'Ta'himmin and Lisol Aloorn-Taro have prevailed on their grandfather to enter a plea for its return. They say it is skilled in playing games, and good for defense. Besides all that, it helped to fix their nursebeast. So they want it back, even if it does eat a lot.'
' 'It'? A toy! Huh! I'll fix them.' She began to purse her lips. Hastily, the captain clamped his hand over her mouth.
Hantis shook her head 'The demand will be denied, of course. This is just their grandfather's way of raising a public vote of gratitude to you, Leewit. He is a powerful sub-clan head. This is how you gave rise to your own name, you know, as well as saving two great ones among my people. Ta'himmin Aloorn-Taro is credited with much of the restoration. And his sister is remembered as Lisol the Healer.'
Hantis smiled oddly. 'It is a bit strange to see my own distant and famous ancestor as a very little girl-Sprite. As you know, the youngest daughter of my house is always called 'the Leewit.' Toll and Threbus asked me for a good name for you, so I offered them one of ours. I never knew where it came from, until now. Ta'himmin and Lisol never forgot you.'
The latest of the universe's Leewits dissolved into tears. The captain decided it was safe to remove his hand. But he still did so a bit warily. With the Leewit . . .
You never knew.
CHAPTER 33
The power rooms of Aloorn were hidden deep within the stalk of the castle.
They were heavily guarded both by ordinary and klatha means, but with the High Lord at their side those barriers were passed. Arvin had walked slowly, talking to Hantis, both of them looking sad and serious. From what the captain could work out, it would be a grim time and hard tasks ahead for the young Sprite Lord, for which he'd get much blame and little credit.
Down here, underneath the huge humming turbines, the captain hoped that they would be invisible to the vatches. Silver-eyes certainly hadn't followed them. The captain fashioned his hooks of klatha force for the big creature, with heat like a kiss of the sun. He put barbs on them, and not threads of force but broad ropes of it. This vatch wasn't going to get away, if he could catch it at all.
They waited. The Sprites also had folk who could rell vatch, and while the party from the
And it did.
The signal came down.
'All right, everybody onto the hoist. Go, go, go!' yelled the captain. They tumbled onto the hoist and rushed upwards. As they rose the captain became aware of the big vatch. He flung those hooks of force, flung them around and over the huge shifting cloud of vatch. They hooked into the black energy swirls, they hauled and tightened.
The vatch yowled. Green slitted eyes peered fearfully at him. NOT AGAIN! MONSTER, LET ME GO!
Not unless you do what I say—or I'll tear you apart and short out your innards! Playing with us! Take us back to our ship and our time right now! No. Wait. Let's finish things here properly. Let me see where those Nanite- possessed ones fled to.
The towers that Hantis had pointed out as 'fabled Delaron' sprang into view from the grayness that was vatchspace. And then the elegant, slim towers shrank and broadened. The captain blinked. There weren't twenty of them. Just one. This tower looked like the others had—only this looked like it could be built with bricks and mortar. It was impressive but not impossibly tall. And looking in—somehow as if he had X-ray vision, he saw a group of Sprites in an upper chamber. Once again his vision shifted as if he was now seeing into the Sprites, and he saw them as a seething mass of myriad tiny klatha black energy points . . . all but three of those present in the upper chamber. The Nanites were klatha or klatha-using creatures too, and this was apparently what they looked like to a vatch.
Pausert directed a bolt of dark energy, torn from the mass of the great roiling thing that was the vatch, at each of the Nanite-creatures. It absorbed the little sparks of klatha energy that were billions of Nanites, and consumed the bodies in gouts of incandescent heat. He saw the three noninfected ones flee, and then he finished
