Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Without clear sight of what he was fighting, he struck down with his knife and felt it slit flesh. The snarl was a scream of rage as the creature twisted in midair for a second try at him. In that instant Sssuri, leaning halfway out of the hatch, struck in his turn, thrusting his bone knife into shadows which now boiled with life.
Instead of displaying the usual fearless interest in strangers, the animal took one swift look at them and fled as if a snake-devil had snorted at its thumping heels. And Dalgard received a sharp impression of terror, as if the hopper saw in him some frightening menace. "What ?" Honestly astounded, he looked to Sssuri for enlightenment. The hoppers could be pests.
It will be wise for us to learn what they wanted here." "Have they come to establish a base here once more?" Dalgard brought into the open the one threat which had hung over his own clan since they first learned that a few of Those Others still lived even if overseas. "If that is their plan, they have not yet done it." Sssuri rolled over on his back and stretched.
But Dalgard could not agree. "Better for you with your night sight," he objected, "but I do not have your eyes in my head." Sssuri had to admit the justice of that. He could travel under the moonless sky as sure-footed as under broad sunlight. But to guide a blundering Dalgard through unknown country was not practical.
"I have been thinking " Sssuri broke into his companion's chain of reasoning, "of what we may do. And perhaps there is a way to reach the sea more swiftly than by returning overland." "Downriver? But you said that way may have its watching devices." "Which would be centered on objects coming upstream, not down. But in this city there should be yet another way "
"After the manner of his people he seeks new things so that he may return and report to his Elders. Then he will receive the spear of manhood and be ready for the choosing of mates," Sssuri translated the reason for Dalgard's quest into the terms of his own people. "He has been my knife brother since we were cubs together, and so I journey with him. But here in the north we have found evil "
But there was something odd Dalgard brushed aside a tendril of weed which cut his line of vision and so was able to see clearly. White and clean most of those bones were, but the skull was blackened, and similar charring existed down one arm and shoulder. That merman had not died from any mishap in the sea! "It is so," Sssuri replied to his thought.
And oddly enough it also bothered him to occupy a post which earlier had served not a nonhuman such as Sssuri, whom he admired, but a humanoid whom he had been taught from childhood to avoid if not fear.
They came to a stretch where Sssuri set his hands on holds, patiently shoved his feet into hollowed places, finding for him the ladder steps he could not see, which took him through a sweating, fearful journey of yards to another level, another sloping, downward way.
Sssuri sped on silent feet, his shoulders hunched, his distaste for the structures to be read in every line of his supple body. When they reached the top, Dalgard turned to gaze down to the restless sea. What a prospect! Perhaps Those Others had built thus for reasons of defense, but surely they, too, must have paused now and then to be proud of such a feat.
Word Of The Day