The Man-Kzin Wars 01

“It seems that you can,” she said grudgingly.

“I could have killed you as you slept. Or brought one of the other prret out of stasis and made her my consort. Any number of things, Kit.” Her nod was slow, and almost human. “Do you swear to obey me hereafter, and not to attack me again?”

She hated it, but she said it: “Yes. I— misjudged you, Rockear. If all men can do what you did, no wonder you win wars.”

He saw that this little charade might get him in a mess later. “It is a special trick of mine; probably won't work for male kzin. In any case, I have your word. If you forget it, I will make you sorry. We need each other, Kit; just like I need a sharp edge on my knife.” He lowered his arm then, offering her his hand. “Here, come outside and help me. It's nearly dark again.”

She was astonished to find, from the sun's position, that she had “slept” almost a full day. But there was no doubting he had spent many hours on that airboat of his. She helped him for a few moments, then remembered that her kiln would now be cool, the bowls and water jug waiting in its primitive chimney. “May I retrieve my pottery, Rockear?”

He smiled at her obedient tone. “If I say no?”

“I do it tomorrow.”

“Go ahead, Kit. It'll be dark soon.” He watched her bounding away through high grass, then hurried into the cave. He had to put that stasis gadget back where he'd got it or, sure as hell, she'd figure it out and one fine day he would wake up hogtied. Or worse.

* * *

Locklear's praise of the pottery was not forced; Kit had a gift for handcrafts, and they ate from decorated bowls that night. He sensed her new deference when she asked, “Have you chosen a site for the manor?”

“Not until I've explored further. We'll want a hidden site we can defend and retreat from, with reliable sources of water, firewood, food — not like this cave. And I'll need your help in that decision, Kit.”

“It must be done before we wake the others,” she said, adding as if to echo his own warnings, “And soon, if we are to be ready for the kzintosh.”

“Don't nag,” he replied. He blew on blistered palms and lay full-length on their grassy bower. “We have to get that airboat working right away,” he said, and patted the grass beside him. She curled up in her usual way. After a few moments he placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Thank you, Rockear,” she murmured, and fell asleep. He lay awake for another hour, gnawing the ribs of two sciences. The engineering of the airboat would be largely trial and error. So would the ethology of a relationship between a man and a kzin female, with all those nuances he was beginning to sense. How, for example, did a kzin make love? Not that he intended to — unless, a vagrant thought nudged him, I'm doing some of it already…

Two more days and a near-disastrous capsizing later, Locklear found the right combination of ballast and sail. He found that Kit could sprint for short distances faster than he could urge the airboat, but over long distances he had a clear edge. Alone, tacking higher, he found stronger winds that bore him far across the sky of Kzersatz, and once he found himself drifting in cross-currents high above that frost line that curved visibly, now, tracing the edge of the force cylinder that was their cage.

He returned after a two-hour absence to find Kit weaving more mats, more cordage, for furnishings. She approached the airboat warily, mistrusting its magical properties but relieved to see him. “You'll be using this thing yourself, pretty soon, Kit,” he confided. “Can you make us some decent ink and paper?”

In a day, yes, she said, if she found a scroll-leaf palm, to soak, pound, and dry its fronds. Ink was no problem. Then hop aboard, he said, and they'd go cruising for the palm. That was a problem; she was plainly terrified of flight in any form. Kzinti were fearless, he reminded her. Females were not, she said, adding that the sight of him dwindling in the sky to a scudding dot had “drawn up her tail” — a fear reaction, he learned.

He ordered her, at last, to mount the raft, sitting in tandem behind him. She found the position somehow obscene, but she did it. Evidently it was highly acceptable for a male to crowd close behind a female, but not the reverse. Then Locklear recalled how cats mated, and he understood. “Nobody will see us, Kit. Hang on to these cords and pull only when I tell you.” With that, he levitated the airboat a meter, and stayed low for a time — until he felt the flexure of her foot talons relax at his thighs.

In another hour they were quartering the sky above the jungles and savannahs of Kzersatz, Kit enjoying the ride too much to retain her fears. They landed in a clearing near the unexplored end of the lake, Kit scrambling up a thick palm to return with young rolled fronds. “The sap stings when fresh,” she said, indicating a familiar white substance. “But when dried and reheated it makes excellent glue.” She also gathered fruit like purple leather melons, with flesh that smelled faintly of seafood, and stowed them for dinner.

The return trip was longer. He taught her how to tack upwind and later, watching her soak fronds that night inside the cave, exulted because soon they would have maps of this curious country. In only one particular was he evasive.

“Rockear, what is that thing I felt on your back under your clothing,” she asked.

“It's, uh, just a thing your warriors do to captives. I have to keep it there,” he said, and quickly changed the subject.

* * *

In another few days, they had crude air maps and several candidate sites for the manor. Locklear agreed to Kit's choice as they hovered above it, a gentle slope beneath a cliff overhang where a kzinrett could sun herself half the day. Fast-growing hardwoods nearby would provide timber and firewood, and the stream burbling in the throat of the ravine was the same stream where he had found that first waterfall down near the lake, and had conjectured on the age of Kzersatz. She rubbed her cheek against his neck when he accepted her decision.

He steered toward the hardwood grove, feeling a faint dampness on his neck. “What does that mean?”

“Why, marking you, of course. It is a display of affection.” He pursued it. The ritual transferred a pheromone from her furry cheeks to his flesh. He could not smell it, but she maintained that any kzin would recognize her marker until the scent evaporated in a few hours. It was like a lipstick mark, he decided—

“Or a hickey with your initials,” he told her, and then had to explain himself. She admitted he had not guessed far off the mark. “But hold on, Kit. Could a kzin warrior track me by my scent?”

“Certainly. How else does one follow a spoor?”

He thought about that awhile. “If we come to the manor and leave it always by air, would that make it harder to find?”

Of course, she said. Trackers needed a scent trail; that's why she intended them to walk in the nearby stream, even if splashing in water was unpleasant. “But if they are determined to find you, Rockear, they will.”

He sighed, letting the airboat settle near a stand of pole-straight trees, and as he hacked with the dulled w'tsai, told her of the new weaponry: projectiles, beamers, energy fields, bombs. “When they do find us, we've got to trap them somehow; get their weapons. Could you kill your own kind?”

“They executed me,” she reminded him and added after a moment, “Kzinrett weapons might be best. Leave it to me.” She did not elaborate. Well, women's weapons had their uses.

He slung several logs under the airboat and left Kit stone-sharpening the long blade as he slowly tacked his way back to their ravine. Releasing the hitches was the work of a moment, thick poles thudding onto yellow-green grass, and soon he was back with Kit. By the time the sun faded, the w'tsai was biting like a handaxe and Kit had prepared them a thick grassy pallet between the cliff face and their big foundation logs. It was the coldest night Locklear had spent on Kzersatz, but Kit's fur made it endurable.

Days later, she ate the last of the kzin rations as he chewed a fishnut and sketched in the dirt with a stick. “We'll run the shamboo plumbing out here from the kitchen,” he said, “and dig our escape tunnel out from our sleep room parallel with the cliff. We'll need help, Kit. It's time.”

She vented a long purring sigh. “I know. Things will be different, Rockear. Not as simple as our life has been.”

He laughed at that, reminding her of the complications they had already faced, and then they resumed notching logs, raising the walls beyond window height. Their own work packed the earthen floors, but the roofing would require more hands than their own. That night, Kit kindled their first fire in the central room's hearth, and