made it obliquely up the hill and across the rocks above. Rscil felt three or more, and he struck out with his spear, while clutching at his waist for his battle claws. Another jab missed, but he was still under and being held. His arm burned and his lungs started to.
The spear was jammed in the riverbed, so he could only use it for support, as cold water shoved at his nostrils and throat, sloshed in his ears and pulled at him. He got a fist in his battle claws, though, and raised them with a grin that he restrained just in time to avoid choking.
With a firm thrust and shove, he accomplished two things. He pushed his head above water, and he sliced the guts of his rightmost antagonist into tatters that leaked and bled in a boiling surge of color.
The talonmaster swung his battle claws gleefully around and watched for just a moment as a Liskash’s expressionless face shredded like a wind-ripped tent. The thing convulsed and thrashed and at last made a squealing sound as its feet kicked and it fell away. That freed Rscil’s spear, but he left it in the chest of the third, that clutched at it and drooled blood as Rscil swam downstream, spitting gory water.
Quickly, Rscil assessed. There were other melees in progress, as Oglut’s slaves tried to overwhelm them by sheer numbers. The live Liskash used the twitching dead as stepping stones, and seemed determined to catch every Mrem point they could.
It would work, Rscil realized. They’d run out soon enough, and then, regardless of claws and teeth, they’d be buried under revolting lizard flesh. He watched one catapult itself over its predecessors, clear a gap in the First where no one had any longarms left, to land amid the Dancers, who snarled and howled and ripped it apart with javelins and claws.
Three beats later the Dancers were back in formation, panting and glazed red, but singing and waving.
But a glance back showed that Claws Eight and Seven were scrambling up the north bank, reaching down to help the Dancers ahead of them. There were holes in the front, where the bravest had died, but Aedonniss-and especially Assirra-willing, the rest would get up that bank, and have high ground from which to stab the disgusting lizards.
We’ll be heading north soon enough, he told himself.
Then the talonmaster ordered, “Quick now, and even! Thrust and block! and thrust and block! and step! and thrust! and step! and thrust!” His arm hurt, but he ignored the pain. Almost everyone near him showed small wounds.
At least the nearest heard him over the din of dying Liskash, and swung their points in unison. It worked, creating a wall of bodies again that hindered the advance until the water dislodged some into the shifting ripples.
Then they were all on the silt and debris of the north bank. Sharp gravel had never felt so wonderful. The talonmaster pulled at the nearest warrior and Dancer, shouting, “Keep position! And keep dancing!”
He could hear left feet stomping as the retreating claw took back its position. Those farther back passed forward their spears, keeping their javelins for themselves.
Rscil hadn’t heard that roar before, but he knew what it meant.
“ Retreat at the double! ” he shouted. “ Retreat at the double! ”
He heard someone echo it before the sound was lost.
If they could only get up that slippery bank…
Oglut saw victory. A sheer wave of dispensable slaves, petty criminals and mindweak inferiors hurled themselves against the lead Mrem. They might hide it from his sons, but he saw that the front rank had all the stoutest and best. Beyond that were lesser-built males and even females. Crack that facade and the rest would flee.
They were moving faster, already, eager to retreat from him. They slipped and clambered backward up the bank, using their spears for support and traction. He had them, and now for the kill, and once he tasted their anguish, he would draw them into his fold and make them his. They would entertain him, clean the herd beasts, scrub latrines, all the lowest tasks.
He urged his trunklegs on, drawing his high-wheeled chariot, bedecked in its glittering silver and bluestone, in a bumpy ride down the bank and across the mud. It wasn’t dignified, but none would notice. With enough speed, the animals managed not to mire, though they did struggle. His wheels sank, but dragged and rolled, and then he was in the river, up high, looking down on the puny victims. A wounded one waved an arm before him, and he steered to crush it under the left wheel, feeling a rise and crunch as he ran over its ribs.
It was then another distraction on the left caught his attention. He glanced over, and froze in wonder. Was it magic? Some trick of a storm? But the sky was clear and blue, and a rushing wall of water roared toward him, brown with dirt and spitting froth and weeds.
Was their damnable god real?
The far flank disappeared under it, others turned to run even before he gave the order, and a handful of Mrem scrambled farther up the bank, as one slipped and submerged. He had no time to balance that small frisson with the searing hatred and disgust welling up inside. The water was easily twice his height as it rose over the chariot, tumbling him with it and bruising him with heavy river cobbles that smashed and burned. He sealed his nostrils and grasped for support, but the chariot was atop him, the trunklegs thrashing upside down and tangled as they drowned, and he knew he was to follow in moments. He recalled he’d wanted to see the New Sea. It had even come to him.
He pressed forth his will for his surviving slaves to fight in reckless, unending abandon, but knew it was pointless. Stupid creatures. Many had run from the far dry bank right into the path of this flood.
He felt them crying, panicking, dying, and a swell of elation from the cursed mammals, then the odd burning of water inside him.
After that, there was only the sighing of the waves.
Cata
JODY LYNN NYE
JOHN RINGO
They Danced and the minions of evil perished. But the minions were many and they were too few. Finally the Dancer stood assailed in her body and mind. “Guide my claws,” Cassa Fisook prayed. And Assirra heard her and entered her. And so filled with the power of Assirra, Cassa Danced as never before, with such grace and purpose that no demon could stand before her. And thus through her the goddess gave all moved to worship her the Dance of Death. – The Book of Bau, verse ninety-seven
Catas are stories of beauty and pain. -Ancient Mrem saying
S herril Rangawo tiptoed softly into the pavilion under cover of the music, careful not to disturb the Dancers’ ritual. As counselor to Their most august Sinuousnesses, he had the privilege to view but not interrupt. He wished they had been resting; how satisfying it would have been to be able to make a grand entrance and fall at their feet exhausted! He had thought about it all the way back from Ckotliss, the stronghold of Tae Shanissi. The very relief he felt at being alive at all, let alone in one piece made him want admiration and sympathy. He promised himself now to be stoic and modest, all the more to make those waiting admire him more. Since he wore no weapons, he made no sound as he slid into a fold of the heavy hide tent. His charcoal-gray fur allowed him to blend with the shadows to await the end of the ritual. The chamber, the center of the Lailah clan’s mobile city since they had left their flooded valley many leagues to the east, was formed of rectangular tents open to a central square that let in the sky. Under the hot sun of noon, the Dancers danced. He breathed the sharp, leather-scented air, and watched.
The slender, black-furred females wove a hypnotic pattern, sliding in and out among one another, as if they
