Slaves of The Klau

'Would we survive?'

'The question of survival is not the point under discussion.'

'Wrong. That's what I'm talking about. Every time I go out stealing things, I may or may not survive. And with me dead there's nobody else here with enough brains to get us off Magarak. So'-Barch scratched a cross through the first division-'out. Unnecessary. What is this?'

In a subdued voice Porridge said, 'These are tools. Some I cannot translate, since they are very specialized. This is a hoist. This is a wire-splicer. These are various kinds of hammers, gauges, rotary buffers. All are quite necessary.'

Barch sat back angrily. 'What's wrong with you, Porridge? Do you think you're in a warehouse? We're out in the mountains. I thought Lenape were intelligent people. Why don't you ask for cushioned workbenches, automatic power-drills?'

'We did,' said Porridge. 'Right there.'

Barch snorted. 'You're worse than the Lekthwans-you've got yourselves in a mental rut; you can't think anything but what someone's thought for the last million years. Haven't you ever heard of the word improvise?' Porridge screwed up his face.

'Buffer-what do you want a buffer for? Forget it! Hammers? Use a rock. Hoist? Run a sling under that little Klau raft.' Barch crumpled the parchment in disgust. 'I'll tell you what you're going to get: welding equipment, deck plates, and fuel for the engines. We'll probably have another barge or two before we're done; you can strip it of any spare parts you need.'

Porridge sat down heavily, kneaded his forehead. 'You have a peculiar concept of comfortable space- travel.'

'I'm not interested in comfort. Now you go back, start installing the sustenators, as many as the group of us will need. Also bring one down here, set it running; then we won't need to leave the cave for food, and we'll be safe from Klau hunters.'

Porridge departed. Barch, looking after him, saw Tick come diffidently into the room. 'Tick,' called Barch, 'come over here.'

Tick sidled up to the bench without much enthusiasm. Barch looked into his long sallow face. 'What's the trouble?'

'I feel the pressure of my time. I sense the odor of death. If I once more owned the charm of my destiny, I would be secure when all else dissolves in fire and ruin.'

Barch said thoughtfully. 'From one point of view-yes. But the charm is surely as effective in my possession as it is in yours. Now sit down, and tell me the best place to steal welding supplies.'

Rain fell into Palkwarkz Ztvo, curtains and streamers gray as mourning crepe, hiding the twilight. The black mountain-side blurred and melted like dark sugar; black fronds pounded and dripped.

Barch, Tick and Kerbol had gone off in the raft an hour since. The Lenape sat grouped at the far table, muttering excitedly, tapping the table with fluttery little fingers, from time to time referring to calculations on a sheet of parchment. Lkandeli Szet, the sad-eyed musician in the embroidered black and green smock, sat drawing planget vibrations from his string-box; beside him squatted the Calbyssinians, blowing windy organ notes through their fingers; Chevrr, the hatchet-faced Splang, crouched as near to the fire as possible, mending a tear in his leggings; the light made moving pools of black along his deep-marked face. Flatface lay facedown on the bench while his women massaged his back; on the ground beside him a listless dice game was in progress. Only Pedratz displayed excitement, and this because he read omens in the fall of the dice.

Komeitk Lelianr came quietly into the hall. She crossed to the entrance, wound through the S-shaped crevice, stood looking out into the rain. Darkness was absolute; there was nothing visible but the hissing vibration.

She turned away from the entrance, looked around the hall. Two big tables, benches, shadowy walls, crackling fire. The plaintive sounds of Lkandeli Szet and the Calbyssinians. The smell of flesh and cooking and smoke. She closed her eyes. Outside were the dark mountains of Palkwarkz Ztvo and the black skies, heavy as an ocean. This was her place until dying-time, unless-

But suppose Roy were killed tonight? Then she might despair indeed-even though she had never permitted herself hope. But Roy Barch worked, Roy Barch effectuated, Roy Barch brought the possibility of escape within mental grasp. With Roy Barch dead, life became stagnant, squalid, with this cave her life and her death. Her eyes grew moist; it came before her mind, suddenly large, that only the optimism of Roy Barch made Palkwarkz Ztvo bearable… A curious race, the Earthers. Young, only a few years removed from savagery, contaminated by the past, correspondingly exuberant and direct.

She considered Barch's word dynamic. Odd that he should feel the essential characteristic of his culture so clearly. She wondered briefly about Earth: had the Klau infested it yet, as they had half a dozen other worlds? And what of Lekthwa? The longing grew too great, hope she could not allow herself; it would be self-torture even to encourage Roy. Hard on Roy, she thought. Roy gave the effort, the force; he was thanked by none. Barch, in the mind of the tribe, had become equivalent to hard work, when sitting beside the fire was easier, more pleasant.

An hour passed, during which the Lenape rose in a body, trooped into Clet's old chamber and carefully laid themselves down to sleep.

Another hour went. The fire flickered and lapsed to coals. Komeitk Lelinar started listlessly toward her quarters.

Footsteps scraped and thudded outside the cave; Barch stood swaying in the entrance. Tick pushed past him, crouched by the fire. Barch's eyes swept the cave. 'Where is everybody?' His voice was hoarse.

Komeitk Lelianr said, 'They've gone to bed.'

'Bed!' Barch's voice cracked with emotion. 'They go to bed while-' He stopped.

' Roy,' said Komeitk Lelianr, 'what's wrong with your arm?' Barch was clutching the region of his left side in a peculiar manner.

He came forward, sank down on a bench, said breathlessly to Tick, 'Wake up the tribe. There's a barge outside. We've got to bury it in Big Hole.'

' Roy,' said Komeitk Lelianr. 'Your arm…' She felt suddenly weak in the knees.

'My arm and Kerbol,' said Barch, 'both back on the mudflats.' She saw he was crying, tears of grief and exhaustion. Carefully she pulled the bloody rags away from the stump, and went a little dizzy. Faces peered over her shoulder, dull masks with eyes and nostrils wide, aroused to morbid excitement.

Barch said weakly, 'Don't stand here; get to work. Chevrr! Where's Chevrr?'

'Here.' The hatchet-faced Splang came out of the shadows.

'You know what to do… Open up the wall, slide the barge in, close it up again. Take over for me; I'm all in.'

The hall was empty, except for Barch and Komeitk Lelianr. Barch lay on the bench, talking at random. 'We got it all in this load-tools, welding tape, welder, deck sheeting… There were Bornghalese on the dam. We waited to grab some lights, portable lights. They came running.'

'Lie still, Roy. Lie quiet.'

'My left hand hurts-in the palm-and I don't have a left hand. It's mixed up in the mud with Kerbol… Oh, what a sight…'

Komeitk Lelianr tried to remember Lekthwan medicine, but the oddments and theories had no immediate bearing on a stump of an arm.

Pfluga, Flatface's second woman, too fat for work, came wheezing in to build up the fire. She peered at the arm. 'And what will you do?' she asked Komeitk Lelianr.

'I don't know.'

Pfluga snorted. 'There's only the one way.' She thrust a heavy poker into the coals.

Barch fainted, and when the smell of burning flesh reached her nostrils, Komeitk Lelianr likewise fainted.

Pfluga snorted, sniffed, stirred the fire up under a pot of hot water. There would be calls for food and hot tea before the night was over.

Barch opened his eyes, reached out to pull himself to a sitting position, fumbled ineffectually with the air. He realized that he no longer had a left arm, propped himself awkwardly with his right. He looked at his bandage. Clean gray cloth. The stump ached, not unbearably.

Komeitk Lelianr knelt beside him with a bowl of gruel. 'How do you feel?'