Dumarest turned and strode toward the ship, the ramp the open hatch. Talion was on guard. As Ysanne passed through he said, 'How about sealing the hull, Earl? I could do with some sleep.'
As could they all. Dumarest nodded. 'Seal us tight. Urich?'
'With the captain. I think something's up.'
Batrun was in the passage, Urich at his side, both men looking haggard. Tiredness had molded them into a common pattern, age-differentials fading, so at a glance they almost seemed brothers. The illusion vanished as Dumarest came close.
'Andre? Any luck?'
'A little, but-' The captain broke off, looking at Urich. 'Trouble,' he said flatly. 'It could be bad. Eunice is in there with the captive.'
It stood against the bulkhead, tall, strong, wearing a demonic face. A thing of darkness which fitted the picture culled from ancient tales and mythical sagas. A wide metal belt circled its waist, a chain running from it to the bulkhead to restrict free movement. Before it a line slashed the deck at the limit of its reach.
A crimson warning Eunice had chosen to ignore.
'She must have been waiting her chance,' whispered Batrun. 'I'd been bribing it with odd foods, sugar and the like, and it seemed to respond. I went to get a recorder and when I came back she was in the cabin.'
Dumarest looked at the small bowls set on the floor. 'Urich?'
'Came when I was standing here wondering what the hell to do.' Batrun fumbled at his snuff box. 'It hasn't been long, Earl, but it seems a lifetime.'
And to Urich an eternity. Dumarest reached out and gripped him by the arm, holding him as he lost his balance and staggered.
'Easy,' he said. 'Take it easy.'
'How can you say that?' Urich's face was beaded with sweat. 'Eunice-my God, can't you see?'
A tableau depicting demonic worship, the seduction of evil, the meeting of unholy partners-the scene fitted a variety of interpretations. The girl stood beyond the warning line, tall, regal, head tilted back so as to look into the angel's mask. It loomed above her, wings lifted a little to form a somber background. The hands, extended, clasped the golden beauty of her hair. Against it the vicious claws looked like metallic daggers.
'A move,' said Urich. 'One move and it will rip the face from her skull, tear out her throat, drive those things into her brain.'
'Steady,' said Dumarest. 'It hasn't done it yet.'
And perhaps lacked the interest. The pose could be a threat or a caress. Like the posture itself, it held more than one interpretation. Behind him he heard Ysanne's sudden intake of breath.
'Beautiful!' she whispered. 'My God, how beautiful! I want-Earl!'
She was locked in the grip of a sudden passion. Dumarest looked at her eyes, the moist laxity of her mouth, the minute quiver of her hands. The heat of her feminity was a flame of urgent desire. The angel? Her eyes were directed at its shape, the spread of its wings.
To Batrun he said, 'Get Ysanne out of here. Fast!'
'Earl?'
'It must be close to their mating time. She's reacting to emitted pheromones. Move her. Now!'
As the captain obeyed Urich said, 'And Eunice? What about her?'
Eunice was affected as Ysanne had been but was less barbaric, slower to yield to stimulated emotion. And her own conviction that the angel was other than it was diverted her response.
'You came,' she murmured. 'My lord of darkness. I called and you came. Answering my summons with your legions. To send them against the Ypsheim. To destroy them!'
Rend them into sodden masses of oozing tissue, faces gone, eyes, noses. Stomachs ripped open to spill steaming intestines. Backs broken, necks, skulls shattered to release the slime of brain. Death to those who had dared to abduct her! Only in their destruction could the insult be avenged!
A moment of giddy exultation which turned the smooth contours of her face into the ugly mask of a beast.
Watching, Dumarest saw the clawed hands lift a little, the claws flex, the fingers again close on the golden skull. To Urich he said, quickly, 'She's your woman-save her!'
'How?'
'The angel is responding to her emotions. You saw her face. She's thinking of death and destruction and it will react unless given something else to think about.'
A male, fired with the need to breed, holding a female before him. A woman despite her lack of wings-Ava had sworn of a common humanity. An object, then, of desire, but Urich was also a male and, as Dumarest had said, Eunice was his woman.
But how to fight?
The answer came with the question. With the mind, the emotions, the emanations the angel would sense. The raw stuff of emotion which he had repressed too long, but which now must be released.
And, suddenly, Urich was young again. Standing in a shadowed street watching a drunken spacer coming toward him. One with money in his pocket-the stuff of freedom. He felt again the desperation, the fear, the false anger created to stiffen determination. The rage against a society which had driven him to crime. The fury of an animal at bay intent on survival.
And to breed was to survive.
The clawed hands would lift or there would be no hands, just bloody stumps devoid of claws, fingers, beauty. The eyes would be empty pits, the nose a gaping orifice, the mouth a thing of horror. The feet would go, the proud spurs, the genitals, the wings. Death would come with steel and fire and terror and… and…
The hands lifted from the golden hair.
'You're winning,' said Dumarest. 'Keep it up.'
Open the pit from which Mankind had sprung and reveal the bestiality of his heritage. The endless violence; the hate and fear and cruelty, the killing and maiming for pleasure, the torture, the wars, the horror, the vileness, the consuming greed. The attributes which had given the race the stars; the arrogance, intolerance, indifference to the pain of others. The lack of mercy. The twisting of justice. The compromises, the expediencies, the self- justification. The insanity which had made Mankind unique.
The angel stepped back, hands rising to shield its face as it turned toward the bulkhead, wings falling to drape it in a cloak of red and ebon. A creature yielding to the dominance of another far more savage than itself.
Chapter Thirteen
Ysanne stirred, the movement of her skin a silken rustle on the cover of the wide bed. In the dim, artificial moonglow the unbound mane of her hair spread like a ragged pool of sheened darkness, a richness which framed her face, the eyes now opening from recent sleep.
'Earl!' She moved toward him, arms searching, finding, binding him close. The contours of her body were warm with feminine heat. 'Earl, my darling! My love!'
Passion to which he responded; mounting heights of ecstatic abandon to drift into the valley of satiated desire. Against him the woman snuggled close, the impact of breasts, hips and thighs, points of sensuous intimacy. Her fingers were scented petals caressing his naked flesh.
'Love me, Earl?'
'Yes.'
'Really love me? You aren't just saying it?'
For answer he stroked the mane of her hair, the long curvature of her back, the mounds of her buttocks. A reply which caused her to rear at his side, face hovering over his own, lips pressed against his mouth in a sudden, possessive hunger.
'You're mine! You're mine, Earl-remember that!'
'I won't forget.'
'I'd kill any other woman you looked at!'
'Easy,' he said. 'We don't need to fight.' And then, to lighten the moment, 'You should try to be more civilized.'
