Either way, he had a job to do.
Till I hear otherwise from the sages, I’ve got to keep acting on Danel Ozawa’s orders.
He said we must defend Jijo.
Star gods don’t belong here, any more than sooners do. Less, in fact.
The cry of a mud wren made Dwer slide his torso lower in the water.
Rety’s mimicked call came from a lookout point on a Buyur ruin near the dunes. He scanned above the reeds, and caught sight of a glimmering shape — a patrol robot sent out by the stranded untraekis, returning from its latest search spiral.
The mulc spider read his concern and expressed curiosity.
More dross?
Maintaining aloof reserve, Dwer suggested the creature concentrate on its present task, while he worried about flying things.
Your memories assert one of these hovering mechanisms slew my brother of the highlands. Mad he may have been, but his job was left undone by that untimely end. Now who will finish it?
A fair enough question. This time, Dwer formed words.
If we survive this time of crisis, the sages will have a mulc bud planted in the old one’s lake. It’s our way. By helping get rid of Buyur remains, each generation of the Six leaves Jijo a little cleaner, making up for the small harm we do. The scrolls say it may ease our penance, when judges finally come.
But don’t worry about this robot now. You have a goal to focus on. Over there, in that hull of the larger ship, there is a rip, an opening…
Dwer felt hairs on his neck prickle. He crouched low while the unmistakable tingle of gravitic fields swept close. Clearly this was a more powerful robot than the unit he nearly defeated back at the sooner village. That one still cowered in a hole under the sand, while he and Rety took on its enemies.
He hunched like an animal and even tried thinking like one as the humming commotion passed, setting the tense surface of the water trembling like a qheuen drum. Dwer closed his eyes, but an onslaught of images assailed him. Sparks flew from an urrish forge. Stinging spray jetted over a drowned village. Starlight glinted off a strange fish whose noorlike mouth opened in a wry grin.…
The creepy force receded. He cracked his eyelids to watch the slab-sided drone move east down a line of phosphorescent surf, then vanish among the dunes.
More vines now clustered and writhed around the base of the larger sky boat, bunching to send shoots snaking higher. This whole crazy idea counted on one assumption — that the ship’s defenses, already badly damaged, would be on guard against “unnatural” things, like metals or energy sources. Under normal conditions, mere plants or beasts would pose no threat to a thick-hulled vessel.
In here?
The spider’s query accompanied mental images of a jagged recess, slashed in the side of the untraeki vessel … the result of Kunn’s riposte, even as his air boat plunged in flames. The visual impression reaching Dwer was tenuous as a daydream, lacking all but the most vague visual details. Instead, he felt a powerful scent of substance. The spider would not know or care how Galactic machines worked, only what they were made of — and which concocted juices would most swiftly delete this insult to Jijo’s fallow peace.
Yes, in there, Dwer projected. And all over the outside, as well
Except the transparent mewing port, he added. No sense warning the creatures by covering their windows with slithering vines. Let them find out in the morning. By then, with Ifni’s luck, it would be too late.
Remember—he began. But the spider interrupted.
I know. I shall use my strongest cords.
Mulc monofiber was the toughest substance known to the Six. With his own eyes, Dwer had seen one rare loop of reclaimed filament pull gondolas all the way to the heights of Mount Guenn. Still, a crew of star gods would have tools to cut even that staunch material. Unless they were distracted.
Time passed. By moonlight the marsh seemed alive with movement — ripples and jerky slitherings — as more vines converged on a growing mass surrounding the ship. Snakelike cables squirmed by Dwer, yet he felt none of the heartsick dread that used to come from contact with One-of-a-Kind. Intent is everything. Somehow, he knew this huge entity meant him no harm.
At uneven intervals, Rety used clever calls to warn him of the guard robot’s return. Dwer worried that it might find the cowardly Danik machine, hiding under the sand. If so, the alerted Jophur might emerge, filling the bog with blazing artificial light.
Dwer moved slowly around the vessel; taking its measure. But as he counted footsteps, his thoughts drifted to the Gray Hills, where Lena Strong and Jenin Worley must be busy right now, uniting Rety’s old band with surviving urrish sooners, forging a united tribe.
Not an easy task, but those two can do it, if anyone can.
Still, he felt sad for them. They must be lonely, with Danel Ozawa gone. And me, carried off in the claws of a Rothen machine. They must think I’m dead, too.
Jenin and Lena still had Ozawa’s “legacy” of books and tools, and an urrish sage to help them. They might make it, if they were left alone. That was Dwer’s job — to make sure no one came across the sky to bother them.
He knew this scheme of his was farfetched. Lark would surely have thought of something better, if he were here.
But I’m all there is. Dwer the Wild Boy. Tough luck for Jijo.
The spider’s voice caught him as he was checking the other side of the grounded cruiser, where a long ramp led to a closed hatch.
In here, as well?
His mind filled with another image of the vessel’s damaged recess. Moonlight shone through a jagged rent in the hull. The clutter of sooty machinery seemed even more crowded as vine after vine crammed through, already dripping caustic nectars. But Dwer felt his attention drawn deeper, to the opposite wall.
Dim light shone through a crack on that side. Not pale illumination, but sharp, blue, and synthetic, coming from some room beyond.
The ship probably isn’t even airtight anymore.
Too bad this didn’t happen high in the mountains. Traeki hated cold-weather. A glacier wind would be just the thing to send whistling through here!
No, he answered the spider. Don’t go into the lighted space. Not yet.
The voice returned, pensively serious.
This light … it could interfere with my work?
Dwer assented. Yeah. The light would interfere, all right.
Then he thought no more of it, for at that moment a trace of movement caught his eye, to the southeast. A dark figure waded stealthily, skirting around the teeming mound of mulc vines.
Rety! But she’s supposed to be on lookout duty.
This was no time for her impulsiveness. With a larger moon due to rise in less than a midura, the two of them had to start making their getaway before the untraeki woke to what was happening.
With uncanny courtesy, mulc cables slithered out of his path as he hurried after the girl, trying not to splash too noisily. Her apparent objective was the other crashed ship, the once-mighty sky steed Kunn had used to drop bombs into the Rift, chasing mysterious prey. From the dunes, Dwer and Rety had seen the sleek dart overwhelmed and sent plunging to the swamp, its two human passengers taken captive.
That could happen to us, too. More than ever, Dwer regretted leaving behind Rety’s urrish “husband,” her conscience and voice of good sense.
About the interfering light.
I thought you would like to know.
It is being taken care of.
Dwer shrugged aside the spider’s mind touch as he crossed an open area, feeling exposed. Things improved slightly when he detoured to take advantage of two reed-covered hummocks, cutting off direct sight of the untraeki
