The Torian Pearls rb-25 Page 3

  Blade picked a nearby tree and scrambled up to where two thick branches jutted out from the trunk. Their bases formed a broad, solid platform. He could have slept more comfortably on the ground, but he didn't want to take the risk if he didn't have to. Not all of the large and bad-tempered creatures in this Dimension might be water-dwelling plant-eaters.

  He shifted about, trying to find a position where his arms and legs didn't dangle and nothing dug painfully into his skin. The tree was taller than most of its neighbors, and through gaps in the leaves Blade could catch glimpses of the forest spreading away in all directions.

  To the north and the west he saw beyond the forest the faint loom of more and higher hills. He saw hints of jagged summits, a thin silvery plume of steam or smoke, and then something that made him stop and look again.

  In the shadows along the flank of one hill a small circle of orange light flickered. It was impossible to be certain what it was or how far away it lay. It might be volcanic activity, but Blade had also seen circles of campfires that looked exactly like this from a distance.

  He looked again, and saw that the darkness behind that hill and its neighbors on either side was not quite perfect. A dim, diffused glow with a faint tinge of orange seemed to be spread along that portion of the horizon. More campfires-the campfires of an army whose scouts he could see on this side of the hill?

  Blade started wedging himself firmly into place. He wasn't going anywhere tonight, even if a city of solid gold lay under that distant orange glow. He knew the value of doing his exploring with a rested body, a clear head, and the light of day to help him.

  He willed himself to ignore the hardness of the branches under him, the roughness of the bark against his skin, the continuous whine of insects and the occasional raucous screech of a night bird. Slowly the world faded away, and he slept.

  Chapter 4

  Blade awoke with a watery sunlight in his eyes and a monumental uproar in his ears. It sounded like a hive of angry bees, a tribe of monkeys, and a rioting football crowd all rolled into one continuous roaring and screeching and droning.

  Blade sat up, stretched to unkink his muscles, and started to climb down the tree. Ten feet above the ground he stopped abruptly and scrambled back up to the nearest branch.

  A herd of low-slung, broad-snouted, grayish-brown animals was flowing past the tree, snorting and grunting and jostling each other. The smallest one must have weighed a lean and sinewy two hundred pounds, and all of there had long dirty yellow tusks. Blade carefully climbed back to a higher branch and waited there for the herd to pass. If those beasts were as bad-tempered as they were ugly, he didn't want to face them with his bare hands.

  There seemed to be no end to the herd. The beasts trotted past by the hundreds, their gruntings and the thud of their hooves rising to drown out all the other sounds of the forest.

  Then suddenly half a dozen dark-striped yellow shapes seemed to explode out of the underbrush or drop down from a nearby tree. Each of the attackers selected a victim from the herd, leaped on its back, and cut halfway through the neck with a single bite. Some of the older boars turned to face the enemy, but were swept away in a snorting, squealing flood as the rest of the herd panicked. The herd vanished with a tremendous thunder of hooves and a deafening crackling and crashing of flattened bushes. They left behind them a good many of their comrades knocked down and trampled, as well as the half dozen taken by the striped beasts.

  These now settled down to feed. They were the size and shape of leopards, with large erect ears and dark bluish stripes instead of spots. Blade waited until they seemed to be paying attention to nothing but their meals. Then he clambered around to the far side of the tree, climbed down as quietly as possible, and ran.

  He kept running until he was sure he was out of sight, scent, or hearing of the blue-striped cats. Then he slowed down to a brisk walk, eyes darting from, side to side, searching for possible attackers or weapons. He tried to follow a course toward the northwest, where he'd seen the lights during the night.

  After an hour the overcast broke up and the sun came out. Now Blade was able to take a bearing every time he came to a clearing. As far as he could see the underbrush was trampled down or eaten bare. Small trees were completely stripped of bark to a height of six or eight feet. The remains of various predators' victims lay thickly, some bare dry skeletons, others sending up ghastly smells of decay and drawing ugly blue-green clouds of insects. In places the bodies lay so thick that Blade had to stuff leaves in his nose to shut out the smell.

  The rising waters seemed to have driven the animals ahead of them. Now many times the usual animal population of the forest was packed into it. They were carrying on a deadly struggle for food and living space, and would be more than usually nervous and combative.

  After another hour Blade found an untrampled stand of thorny bushes and broke off a long branch. The branch wouldn't be much protection against anything larger than a house cat, but it could at least beat off insects and snakes.

  The insects swarmed still more thickly around Blade ad the sun rose higher in the sky and the sweat poured down his body. He chewed on green leaves for their moisture and kept in the shade as much as possible. Last night he'd been in danger of drowning in a waste of undrinkable water. Now he was suffering from thirst in the middle of an apparently waterless forest.

  As the afternoon passed the sky disappeared behind a screen of clouds. The clouds grew slowly thicker and darker, and a breeze began to ruffle the leaves. The breeze became a wind that made the branches and the smaller trees sway, gently at first. The wind blew deliciously cool on Blade's skin.

  Thunder began to roll, rapidly coming closer and growing louder. The branches tossed more wildly, and a dazzling glare flashed across the forest as lightning darted down from the clouds. As the thunder rumbled away into silence Blade heard the crackling and crashing of a tree going over. Then all other sounds were drowned out as the skies opened like the sluice gates of a dam and poured down rain on the forest.

  The rain stung Blade's bare skin like a hailstorm. He threw his head back until his open mouth was turned to the sky, closed his eyes, and drank and drank and drank. As he drank, he felt the rain scouring his skin free of sweat and dirt and the mashed bodies of countless insects.

  He drank until he couldn't drink any more, then started on his way again. The rain settled into a steady downpour, lashed across the forest like a whip by the wind. Thunder crashed and lightning flared and crackled on all sides and directly overhead. Blade found he had to walk constantly looking upward, to avoid being brained by falling branches and whole trees.

  The rain was still pouring down when Blade stepped between two trees and found nothing but saplings and low bushes ahead of him. He peered through the rain, one hand sheltering his eyes from the pelting drops. After a hundred yards of saplings the ground was level, covered with ragged grass swaying in the wind and stretching off to vanish behind the gray veil of the rain.

  Blade stopped. There was no point in wandering aimlessly out onto the plain ahead to end up roaming in circles. He could be at the very foot of the hills where he'd seen the lights, but they would be invisible until the rain stopped.

  Another hour, and the rain began to ease. It was like a series of curtains rising. As each curtain rose, Blade could see a few hundred yards farther out into the gray twilight that was settling across the open land.

  Behind him the forest slowly began to come back to life, as Blade moved out into the open. He kept bearing to the right as he walked. That should bring him to some point along those hills, and after that ….

  He'd gone barely half a mile when he stopped abruptly, to stare down at the grass in front of him. A wide trail was beaten down there, a trail a hundred yards across where the grass lay crushed flat under the prints of human feet and the hooves of animals. In many places the earth lay in parallel brown furrows, gouged up by the wheels of heavy carts or wagons. The trail came out of the rain to Blade's right and v
anished in the misty twilight.

  The grass was still green, without a trace of yellowing. Whoever had passed by here was only a few hours away. Blade knelt to examine the furrows. They were sunk deep into the earth, as if the wagons had been heavily laden. Along the furrows lay half-dissolved piles of purplish-brown dung and occasional bits of fresh reddish-brown meat. Blade picked up one that had a long strip of leathery gray hide still attached.

  He was turning the hide over and over in his hands when he heard a human voice shout out a wordless cry. Three other voices echoed it. He whirled, to see four armed men trotting toward him on creatures that looked like slimmed down oxen.

  Blade thrust the butt of his thorn branch into the mud and stood up, facing the oncoming riders with his hands at his sides. This was as good a time as any to meet the people of this Dimension.

  Chapter 5

  As they saw Blade waiting for them, the riders slowed to a walk. They spread out into a crescent with the points toward Blade and came on as if they had all the time in the world. Three of them weren't even looking at Blade.

  Blade looked at all of them as they approached. All four wore kiltlike garments slit up the side, shapeless calf-length boots, and not a stitch above the waist except two or three necklaces apiece. Their heads were shaved except for a scalp lock running from front to back, and bone earrings dangled from their rather large ears. Their eyes were wide, dark, and totally expressionless; their skins were a dirt-smeared reddish-brown.

  They rode without stirrups, sitting on leather pads tied across the backs of their mounts with rope. Each man had a shortsword slung at his belt and a longsword, a bow, and a quiver of arrows tied on one side of his mount. On the other side hung leather pouches and water bottles.

  The animals' horns curved forward, and each horn divided into two sharp points at the ends. All four points were painted red and one of the animals had a diamond-shaped patch shaved on its forehead. Otherwise they looked very oxlike-broad, thick bodies covered with grayish hair and supported by four heavy splayed-out limbs. They looked built for strength and endurance, not speed.

  The four men reined their mounts to a stop when the nearest one was about ten yards from Blade. None of them dismounted. One of them picked up his bow, nocked an arrow to it, and held it with the arrow's point toward Blade. Two others shifted in their saddles so that between them they could look all around the horizon.

  It was a display of military skill that impressed Blade. These people didn't look hostile, but they were obviously as suspicious of him as he would have been in their place. So they would be efficiently on their guard until they could be sure that he was harmless and alone.

  The fourth man rode the ox with the diamond blazed on its forehead. He raised one hand in a gesture of greeting. Blade noticed he kept the other hand very close to the hilt of his shortsword.

  «Ho, wanderer. Why do you wander here, alone on the trail of the Kargoi?» As always, the alterations in Blade's brain during his passage into this Dimension made the words reach him as plainly as English.

  «The Kargoi have left their trail on the land where I choose to walk,» replied Blade. His English thoughts left his lips as the clicking, hissing speech of the Kargoi. He'd chosen those words to give the impression of a man who wished the Kargoi no harm but did not fear them and would not. With warriors like these there was always a delicate balance. Be too proud, and provoke them to a pointless fight. Be too polite, and be considered a weakling or a coward who can be killed without a second thought.

  The leader's face showed no reaction to Blade's words. There was a moment of silence, broken only by the faint sigh of the wind and the fainter dripping of the last of the rain.

  Then he shifted his hand, until it actually rested on the hilt of his shortsword. It was a gesture meant to be noticed. Blade smiled politely to show he had noticed, met the leader's eyes and held them. Except for the smile and the fixed eyes, Blade's face was as expressionless as the warrior's.

  Without saying a word, Blade wanted to send a vital message:

  «You may be able to kill me, and you may not be. It does not matter to me whether you can or not, or whether you even try. It does matter to you, for you will certainly die whether I do or not.»

  It was a message Blade wanted to send and keep sending until it was firmly impressed on the leader's mind.

  Few men will provoke a battle after they've been firmly assured they are certain to die in it.

  The silence went on. Blade did not take his eyes off the leader, but he shifted his footing slightly. Now he could either stand to face an attack or run to deliver one. It would depend on whether the archer loosed his arrow, or the leader insisted on using his sword.

  The silence went on for a little longer. Then the quiet, grim promise in Blade's leveled eyes and poised body sank into the leader's mind. Slowly he moved his hand away from his sword hilt, and rested it in his lap. Blade noticed that the movement was slightly jerky. He took his eyes off the leader, but didn't relax.

  He'd met and held the man in a silent clash of wills. The man might take this gracefully, as from one warrior to another. Or he might feel a wound to his pride that could drive him to violence more surely than any wound in his body. It was impossible to guess, for the man's face remained expressionless. It seemed a face that would remain expressionless even if the man were being slowly tortured to death.

  Then the leader's other hand flickered in a brief signal. The archer thrust the arrow back in its quiver and laid his bow across his lap. Blade took a deep breath, let it out, and relaxed his own stance, one arm dangling freely and the other hand braced against one hip. He smiled again, and this time the leader smiled back.

  «It takes courage to speak harshly to warriors of the Kargoi,» the man said. «It takes even more courage to speak harshly to them without saying a word.»

  Blade suddenly felt almost friendly toward the leader. The man had pride, but it was the pride of a warrior who knew he was so good that he didn't have to prove it by meaningless bloody little fights. It was also the pride of a warrior whose followers knew that he was good. He could refuse a fight in full sight and hearing of the other three men without losing their respect.

  He looked like a good man to have on one's side in a new Dimension. Other warriors of the Kargoi would listen to him and his judgments. They might not obey him or follow him in battle, but they would hardly slip a knife into a stranger under his protection. Without shedding a drop of anyone's blood, Blade had won his first victory in this Dimension. To win the same victory in other Dimensions he'd had to kill as many as a dozen men.

  The leader crossed his arms on his chest. «Who are you, and what do you seek in this land where the Kargoi have left their trail?»

  «My name is Blade. I seek the Kargoi.»

  «I am Paor. You seek us alone and naked?»

  «I have not heard that one needs to come to the Kargoi with an army, if one does not wish them harm. Their warriors can tell an enemy when they see one and do all that is needed. But those who are not enemies ….» Blade shrugged.

  Paor smiled. He obviously recognized the flattery, but still enjoyed hearing it. Few men can resist being praised for their honorable behavior.

  «Indeed, you know the ways of the Kargoi,» said Paor blandly. «I think the time has come for you to know them better. You shall come to the camp of the Red People and speak before their baudzi.» He turned to one of the other men. «Agik, join Bayus on his mount. Blade, mount upon Agik's drend and we shall take you with us.»

  In a minute the two warriors were doubled up on one drend. In another minute Blade was mounted on the back of the vacant one. Paor took the reins of Blade's mount and tied them with a length of rope to his own straps. Then he remounted and dug his heels into the flanks of his drend. The beast grunted irritably, then lurched into motion. The other warriors fell in behind Blade, and the little party trotted off across the plain, through the twilight.

  Minute by minute, the drends
slowly increased their pace from a leisurely walk to the rolling trot Blade had seen first. Soon they were moving fast enough so that a man would have had to run in order to stay ahead of them. More important, it seemed as though the drends would be able to keep going long after most men had run themselves breathless and collapsed, to be trampled underfoot.

  Blade now understood why the mounted warriors of the Kargoi carried bows and swords, but no lances. The drends were too slow and solid. Even the best warrior mounted on one could hardly press home a charge against an opponent who was free to move.

  On the other hand, this same slowness and solidity made the drends excellent platforms for archery and swordsmanship. Did the Kargoi rain arrows on their opponents from a distance, then close in and go to work with their swords? Blade was intrigued by the idea. He'd never fought a cavalry battle in slow motion before!

  The light was almost gone now, but the sky was clearing. The drends trotted forward, staying in the trampled-down trail but instinctively avoiding the ruts left by the wagon wheels. Off to the left Blade saw the loom of the forest that lay between the plain and the sea. The trail seemed to be running almost parallel to the edge of the forest. No doubt the rich animal life of the forest offered the Kargoi excellent hunting.

  By Blade's rough reckoning, it was two hours after dark when they turned off the trail and stopped. Blade saw they were surrounded by grass heavily grazed in spots but not trampled into the ground. The drends promptly lowered their heads to the standing grass and began munching busily. The warriors dismounted, took nuts and strips of salt meat from their pouches, and began to eat. They seemed to have forgotten Blade's existence.

  Eventually Paor finished his meal, drank some water from his bottle, and came over to Blade. In the darkness his face was unreadable, but his tone was sympathetic.

  «It is unbreakable law that a stranger can neither eat nor drink with warriors of the Kargoi until at least five of the baudzi, the War Guides, have called him worthy. I call you worthy and will go on calling you worthy, but I am alone. Four more baudzi must be found before I can give you food or drink without being cast down among the tent carriers and the dung gatherers.»