'No,' I said.
The head was lacerated, but the wounds were superficial. The throat, however,had been bitten through. The left leg was gone.
'It must have been a survivor,' said Grunt 'The body is clothed. He must havebeen returning to the wagons, perhaps to search for food.'
'I think so,' I said.
'Then a wild sleen must have caught him,' said Grunt.
'The sleen is primarily nocturnal,' I said. I had seen such things before. I didnot think the body bore the marks of a sleen.
'So?' said Grunt.
'Look,' I said. Between my thumb and forefinger there was a dark, viscous stain.
I wiped my fingers on the grass.
'I see,' said Grunt. 'Too,' said he, 'note the torn earth. It is still black.
Grass uprooted near the body, there, has not dried yet. It is still green.'
'Put a quarrel in your guide,' I advised him. It seemed reasonably clear thisattack had occurred within the Ahn.
Grunt looped the reins of my kaiila over the pommel of his saddle.
I stood up, and looked about me.
I heard Grunt arm his bow, drawing back the stout cable, his foot in the bowstirrup, then slotting the quarrel into the guide.
I shuddered, and quickly mounted the kaiila, taking back the reins from Grunt. Iwas pleased to be again in the saddle. Mobility is important in the Barrens.
Too, the height considerably increases one's scanning range.
'It is still here, somewhere,' I said. I glanced to Grunt's bow. He would have,presumably, but one shot with it.
'What is it?' asked Grunt. 'A beast, one of the sort which you seek?'
'I think so,' I said. 'Too, I think that it, like the other fellow, is asurvivor. That it has lingered in the vicinity of the wagons suggests to me thatit, too, was wounded.'
'It will be, then, extremely dangerous,' said Grunt.
'Yes,' I said. Certainly pain, hunger and desperation would not render any suchbeast the less dangerous.
A few feet to the left of the kaiila there was a keg of sugar, which had beensplit open. A trail of sugar, some four inches wide, some three or four yardslong, drained through the split lid, had been run out behind it. It had probablybeen carried under someone's arm. This trove was the object of the patientindustry of ants, thousands of them, from perhaps a hundred hills about. Itwould be the prize, doubtless, in small and unrecorded wars.
Grunt and I moved our kaiila forward. Behind us I heard the red-haired girlvomit in the grass. She had passed too closely to the body.
'Look!' cried Grunt. 'There, ahead!'
'I see it,' I cried.
'Do they not care to defend themselves?' he inquired.
'Hurry.' I said, urging the kaiila forward.
We raced ahead. We were some half pasang beyond the line of strewn, charredwagons behind us. We now approached other wagons, but scattered about. Thesewere the wagons for which I had earlier sought in vain, the smaller, squarishwagons, which bad been with the mercenary column. They, too, seemed broken. Twowere overturned. Some had been burned to the wagon bed, others missed a roof ora roof and wall. To none of them were harnessed tharlarion. Given their distancefrom the other wagons and their distribution in the grass I took it that theyhad broken their column and sped away, as best they might They had not had thetime, or the presence of mind, perhaps, to form a defensive barrier.
Near some three of these wagons there was a small group of figures, perhaps somefifteen or twenty men. One stood out a bit from the others. It was he who wasmost obviously threatened by the brown, looming shape, which had apparentlyemerged from the grass near them. I did not know if they bad disturbed thebeast, or if it lad been moving towards them, until then, at its choice, unseen.
The man held a shovel, but he had not raised it to defend himself. His posturedid not seem brave, but rather phlegmatic. Could it be he did not understand hisdanger?
'Hurry!' I cried to the kaiila.
The paws of Grunt's beast thundered beside my own. 'He is insane!' cried Grunt.
The beast itself seemed puzzled, uncertain, regarding the man.
Never before, perhaps, had it found itself viewed with such incomprehension.
The men wore gray garments, open at the bottom, which fell between the knee andankle.
The beast turned its head suddenly to face us. In less than a handful of Ehn Ipulled up the kaiila, rearing and squealing, between the beast and the man.
The beast snarled and took a step backward. I saw that it was neither Kog norSardak.
'Get back!' I warned the men.
Obediently they all, including the fellow who had been most forward, drew back.
I did not take my eyes from the beast. It raised one darkly stained paw. Thehair between the digits was matted and stuck together. I supposed this was fromthe kill a pasang or so back.
I backed the kaiila a step or two from the beast. 'Back away,' I told the men.
They obeyed.
The fur of the beast was rent and thick, here and there, with clotted blood. Ithink, more than once, it might have been struck with lances. It had perhapslost consciousness in the grass, from the loss of blood, and had been left fordead. It was not the sort of thing the red savages would mutilate. They wereunfamiliar with it. They would presumably classify it with sleen or urts, notmen.
The beast, snarling, took a step forward.
'It is going to attack,' said Grunt. 'I can kill it,' he said. He raised thecrossbow.
'Do not fire,' I said.
Grunt did not discharge the weapon.
'Look at it,' I said.
The beast regarded Grunt, and then myself. Its lips curled back over the doublering of white fangs.
'It is showing contempt for us,' I said.
'Contempt?' said Grunt, puzzled.
'Yes,' I said. 'You see, he is not similarly armed.'
'It is a beast,' said Grunt. But he lowered the weapon.
'It is a Kur,' I said.
The beast then backed away from us, snarling. After a few feet it turned anddropped to all fours, moving through the grass. It did not look back.
I moved the kaiila a few feet forward, to where it had originally stood in thegrass. I wished to study the pattern of grasses there. Then I returned to whereGrunt, and the others, were waiting.
'You should have let me kill it,' said Grunt.
'Perhaps,' I said.
'Why did you not have me fire?' asked Grunt.
'It has to do with codes,' I said.
'Who are you, truly?' asked Grunt.
'One to whom codes were once familiar,' I said, 'one by whom they have neverbeen completely forgotten.'
I brought my kaiila about, and before the fellow who had been most obviouslythreatened by the beast.
'I feared there might be violence,' he said.
'I have examined the grass, whence the beast arose,' I said. 'It had beenapproaching you, unseen. It was stalking you.'
'I am Pumpkin,' he said. 'Peace and light, and tranquility, and contentment andgoodness be unto you.'
