'Whose?' I mind-beamed to Mathan.
'Oskold's there—there—there—' He indicated three. 'The rest—I have not seen that device before.'
The sound of a horn, sharp and clear, cut the small noises of the camp. There was silence for a second and then shouts of welcome.
'Maelen?'
'There!'
Merlay answered my question. What I had taken for a roll of sleep covering lay, unmoving, well into the firelight.
'They fear her—to look into her eyes,' Merlay whispered. 'So they have tied cloaks about her lest she turn them into animals. They have been told that she will do this, that we all shall do this.'
Idid not hear Mathan growl, but I felt the vibration through the fur-clad shoulder pressed close to mine.
'Can we get to her—' I had begun when another party tramped into the firelight. The flames glinted and flashed from ornamentation on cloak and helm. And he who led them was older than the rest.
'Oskold.' Mathan's thought identified him.
Their voices carried, but the words were in the inland tongue and I did not understand. I tried to read the thoughts behind them. There was triumph, satisfaction, anger. Yes, emotions were easier to pick up than words.
One of the fire-feeders stooped and jerked at the bundle which was Maelen, pulling her upright. Meanwhile another stepped forward to grasp the covering about her head and shoulders and pull it loose. Her silver hair shook free, and then she raised her head with a toss which cleared that silver veil from her face; she stood head up and unbending to front Oskold.
''Ware, lord, she will make you beast!' One of his companions laid hand on Oskold's arm to pull him back, the intensity of his thought readable to me.
Oskold laughed. His hand, covered with a glove reinforced across the knuckles with metal strips, swung up to strike Maelen full in the face. She crumpled, down.
So it was Oskold who gave us our signal. The raging fury which now boiled out of the dark, and the tree shadows leaped, tore, screamed, growled, shrieked in that moment after Maelen went down. I heard the cries of men, the tumult of the beasts, but I headed for Maelen.
I was no swordsman and my sword-knife was a poor weapon, but I reverted to Jorth's rage in those moments when flames became a red curtain in my mind, drowning thought, leaving me only one purpose in mind. This was as it had been when I had gone after Osokun and his men—
She was under my hand—still—no life in her, her face up to the sky, the red ruin that blow had wrought on flesh and bone made plain. And I crouched above her, snarling as any of the furred ones who fought about me.
As it had been with the outlaws who had killed Malec and taken our camp, so it was now with these. For there is a kind of horror in such warfare which the minds of men find impossible to comprehend. To have waves of animals break about them unnerved some from the start, fighting men though they were. Others rallied, killed, some standing their ground; others fought a rear-guard action to withdraw, always harassed, pulled down, overrun.
For me there was but one in that enemy company. And knife in hand, I made for him. In spite of the surprise of our attack, at least one of his guards had come to Oskold's side, fending off with his shield two rushes from a pair of venzese who sprang to snap and bounced back to wait another chance.
I tripped over a body and sprawled forward, almost into the heart of the fire. Then my hands, bracing me up again, closed on a beamer— something I had not expected to find there, but which fitted into my palm as familiarly as a long-worn glove. I did not even try to get to my knees; I lay and pressed the firing button of a weapon which had no right to be there.
The ray it threw was a thrust of eye-searing fire. No shield could stand against that, no, nor man either! I had wanted to let Oskold feel my hands upon him as he went down, but I took the means fate sent me and used the off-world arm. Once, twice— Oskold might be on the ground now but there were others of his following—There was a sputter and the ray died, its charge exhausted. I hurled it from me into the fire and crawled back to Maelen.
Above that fearful wound her eyes were now open and she saw me, knew me—of that I was sure. I caught her up and went back into the dark, to that rock where Merlay had been. I staggered a little when I reached that poor shred of cover, so I had to lean against the chill stone. Merlay was still there, but she did not touch what I held, only laid her hand upon my shoulder. A flow of strength was channeled so from her to me.
This was a battle, and it was fought, and men died and animals died, but for me it was a nightmare which I can not well remember. Only at last there was quiet, and we came once more to the fire. For it seems ours was the victory. Yet it might well be that it was also defeat—
I laid Maelen down on the robes Merlay spread to receive her. Still she looked at me and at Merlay, and at the animals who came to her, and last of all to the feline Mathan, who staggered into the fire shine with a wound in his side. But her thoughts did not come to me. Only her eyes told me she still lived.
Suddenly I could not look into them any longer, but got up and walked blindly away, stumbling among the dead. One followed me and sprang to catch my dangling hand between sharp teeth. I glanced down at Borba. A split ear dripped blood, but undaunted eyes met mine.
'Come.'
Because nothing mattered now, I went as he wished and we thread among bushes until we came to where there was a line of picketed kasi. Someone moved ahead of me there, slowly, so slowly I thought he might be wounded. Borba hissed and pulled at my hand, urging me on. The figure, fumbling with a lead rein, swung around to face me. In this lack of light I could not see his face, but that he was a fugitive from the camp, I knew. I leaped for him. Under my weight he collapsed, though he struggled feebly. I struck an off-world blow, felt my slender Thassa hand go numb. But the one under me was still. I hooked fingers into his collar and pulled him with me into the firelit open.
'Krip Vorlund!'
