Angado

Chapter Four

Halting, Dumarest threw back his head and sniffed at the air. Like a dog, thought Angado dispassionately. Like the animal he'd become as they made their way over the endless plain. Sniffing for scent, looking for sign, surviving where no ordinary man could have lasted. A trait he envied while knowing he could never hope to emulate it.

He stumbled, feeling the jar in knees and hips as he fought to regain his balance. The pack he carried was a monstrous hand pressing him down, a load full of trivia which Dumarest refused to discard. He turned to look behind, seeing their trail wending over the rolling plain toward a featureless horizon, one which faded, vanishing, as gusting wind flurried the long grass and resettled it in a new pattern.

The trail they left was as transient as that made by a boat on an ocean. Their progress apparently measured by inches.

He lunged forward, cursing the pull of the grass which hampered his stride and sapped at his energy. Strength too low for the task; the scant food failing to replace that used and, now the food was gone, hunger was turning into starvation.

"Steady!" Dumarest was at his side, a hand firm on his arm. "Take a rest."

"But-"

"Do it!" Dumarest softened his tone. "Rest now and we can keep going until twilight. Be stubborn and you'll collapse after a couple of miles." His knife flashed as he hacked free a bunch of grass. "Here, keep busy with this. Something to fill your stomach." He illustrated running a strand between his teeth to remove the husk and pulp. "See?"

"Can we live on it?"

"No, but it'll give you bulk and some moisture." And give him something to do as well as taking his mind off present difficulties. Dumarest added, "There's a run over there. The sun's low enough to shade it and with luck we'll get something to eat."

He moved off before Angado could comment, one hand delving beneath his tunic to reappear with a scrap of food concentrate wrapped in a cloth. Sweat had soaked into the fabric, adding his own body odor to that of the ripening wafer. Carefully he set it at the place he had noted; one where small tunnels through the grass joined to form a junction. Snares would have created a warning scent and an unusual sight image and Dumarest didn't want to wait longer than necessary. Taking up a position facing the sun, the wind in his face, he poised the knife in his hand and stood, waiting.

A living statue dark against the sky. Angado watched, running strands of grass between his teeth. The gain was small but his mouth welcomed the opportunity to chew and swallow and the moist pulp held a refreshing tartness. More gratifying was the opportunity to rest and he eased the ache in back and legs, bones and muscles.

The pack was a nuisance. The need of the sacs had been demonstrated; spread at night they collected condensed dew and twice the fruit of an intermittent rain. But most of the rest was useless; clothing they would never wear, empty containers, voided ampules… discarded rubbish… stuff which swirled in his mind and created a sudden complexity of dancing patterns.

Angado started, aware that he had dozed, fighting the sleep which clogged his mind. The sun was lower than he remembered but the dark silhouette against the sky was as before. Then, as he watched, Dumarest exploded in a sudden blur of motion. A flash as the knife left his hand, a darting forward, a stoop then he was upright again and coming toward him the creature he had caught impaled on the blade of the thrown knife.

A thing little larger than a rat, which he skinned, filled the pelt with the guts, head and feet, then split the remainder into two segments one of which he handed to Angado.

"Eat it."

"Aren't we cooking it first?"

"There's more energy in it raw." Dumarest bit, chewed, blood rimming his mouth. "We may get something else later on."

Another rodent, a twin of the first, which Angado turned on a crude spit over the smoking fire. It was stringy and, lacking salt, flavorless, but it was hot and something to chew and a filled stomach restored his optimism.

"'I could get to like this kind of life," he said, poking at the fire. "But not without a gun and a few comforts. A sleeping bag, some emergency rations, a radio to summon help if anything went wrong." The smoldering eye flared as it fed on a morsel of fat. As it died Angado said, in a different tone, "How much longer, Earl?"

"As long as it takes."

"How far, then? Damn it, you know what I mean. There has to be someone around. A settlement, a town, civilization of some kind. Even a farm. We just can't wander on forever."

The truth, but they could wander until they died, and, for Angado, that would mean the same thing.

Dumarest said, quietly, "A world's a big place. Any world. Even the residents never get to see all of it and it takes a long time for even them to spread. A planet can be settled, no riches found, the community dwindle to a string of farms. Natural increase will take care of things in time but that means a few thousand years at least. The planets which are heavily populated are old or rich or usually both."

"And, in the Burdinnion, such worlds don't exist." Angado looked at his hands. They were clenched into fists as if he wanted to fight and defeat the truth Dumarest had given him. "Krogstad," he said. "The bastard! He didn't intend for us ever to be found. He as good as killed us."

"We're alive," reminded Dumarest.

"Because of you, not him." Angado drew in his breath, fighting to master his anger. "I'll find him," he said. "If I ever get out of this I'll hunt the bastard down. And when I meet him-" He looked again at his hands. "We'll do it together, Earl. You've the right to be in at the kill."

"Maybe, but I've other things to do."

"You'll let him get away with it?" Angado thought he understood. "I'll do the paying. Perotto can't refuse me funds to gain revenge. He-" He broke off, looking at Dumarest's face, remembering. "You still think he tried to kill me?"

Dumarest said, "That's your problem, not mine. As for the rest if I ever run into Krogstad he'll regret it. But I'm not chasing him."

"You don't want revenge? On Lychen we'd-"

"Is Lychen a vendetta world?"

"Not exactly, but we have pride."

"The old families," corrected Dumarest. "The established clans. Only the rich can afford the type of revenge you're talking about. Only the stupid would pursue it. Families locked in strife, killing each other, using assassination, anything, just to level the score. After a while even the cause of the quarrel is forgotten but the killing goes on."

"And pride remains."

Dumarest said, dryly, "Which, no doubt, is a great comfort to those who bury the dead."

He leaned back, running strands of grass between his teeth, watching Angado's face, illuminated by the glow from the fire, harden from what it had been and not just through loss of underlying fat. The journey was forcing him to face reality; pressure accentuated by Dumarest's talk; deliberately provocative stands taken on subjects the younger man had taken for granted. A means of engaging his mind and testing his attitude. Inflexibility would have shown the man to be brittle and liable to break in an emergency. As it was the black-and-white presentations had helped to soften the monotony of the journey.

Angado said, "Earl, those reports you heard and that flash. On the night we landed."

"Yes?"

"I've never seen anything like them while I've been on watch. Have you?"

"No."

"Yet we're heading toward them. Why? They could have been a natural occurrence."

"I doubt it."

"But you can't be sure."

"No." Dumarest added, "We've talked enough. Will you take the first watch or shall I?"

"I'll take it."

Angado watched as Dumarest settled then turned to look at the surrounding emptiness. The rolling plain of featureless grass now silvered by starlight into a desert of snow, of frost, of uncaring indifference. Later, when tossing in restless sleep, he dreamed of lying on it forever, his skull grinning at the skies.

The next dawn it rained and they lunged forward through wet and hampering grass. Noon brought sun and thrusting winds. Night came with hunger and tormented rest. A pattern repeated with variations over the next three days. On the fourth they reached the end of the plain.

It ended abruptly as if a giant knife had slashed the terrain from side to side in a cut which reached from left to right as far as the eye could reach. A division which proved the plain to be the summit of a plateau rearing high above the ground below. Dumarest halted well clear of the edge, one ornamented with wheeling birds, graced with the susurration of wind.

"God!" Angado, more foolhardy, had dropped to thrust his head over the edge. Turning he waved. "Look at this, Earl! Look!"

From the edge the ground fell sharply in a precipitous slope broken by rocky outcroppings, clumps of vegetation, tufts of grass and clinging vines. An almost sheer surface ending in a mass of scree far below.

"A mile!" Angado drew in his breath. "We must be a mile high at least."

Rising, Dumarest shaded his eyes and studied the terrain beyond. An expanse of raw dirt, trees, rocks, stunted bushes ran to the far horizon. Nowhere could he see signs of habitation. The edge on which he stood could run in a ragged circle and to follow it would mean being trapped on the plain. To descend would be easy and it was important they choose the right place.

He checked the compass and again looked ahead seeing nothing more than before. The instrument could be faulty or distance had compounded small, initial errors. He looked at the sky. The sun was rising and wind droned against the cliff. A blast that carried seeds and dust, leaves and debris which spun as it rode the thermals, fluttering like broken fans.

Without the compass they would have wended toward the right and, for lack of checking sightings, they must have done just that.

"Left," he said to Angado. "We'll move left and hope to find something."

They spotted it at noon, a thread of smoke, a glitter which flashed and vanished from among a clump of trees.

Angado squinted at it, puzzled, shaking his head.

"I can't make it out. There're no houses that I can see and it certainly isn't a town. The smoke must be from an open fire-but the glitter?" He grunted as it came again and quickly vanished. "The sun reflected from a window? A mirror? What?"

"Water," said Dumarest. "That's a camp of some kind. They've got a bowl of water, washing in it, maybe." He checked the direction on the compass. "That's where we'll make for."

"Sure." Angado sat down, relief had brought a sudden weakness. "All we have to do is climb down this cliff."

Dumarest examined it again, finding the surface no different from what it had been before. He checked a probable line of descent; from the edge to an outcropping to where tufts of grass could provide a series of holds, to where a narrow ledge supported a clump of tall, bamboo-like vegetation.

Opening the packs, he sorted out the clothing, the ropes he had made.

"Weave more," he told Angado. "Make them tight and strong."

He set the pace, slicing the clothing with his knife, plaiting the strands, making sure they would hold. When the rope was long enough to reach the ledge he tied it around his waist.

"Hold it fast," he warned the younger man. "If I slip ram it against the ground with your foot and throw your weight against it. Keep it tight-too much slack could jerk you over when it tightens."

"What about the other stuff?" Angado looked at the discarded litter, the sacs and painfully carried items. "You dumping it?"

"This is just a test run. Hold fast now."

Dumarest slipped over the edge, feeling dirt crumble beneath his weight, dropping until his foot hit the rocks he had spotted. More dirt plumed down over him, grit stinging his eyes. Angado's face looked anxiously through a mist of dust.

"All right, Earl?"

"Get back! Watch that rope!"

His lifeline if he should slip but Angado's death together with his own if the man was careless. Dumarest waited then resumed the descent. Grass yielded beneath his weight to reveal crusted stone traced with roots. A second tuft held and he paused to examine the face of the cliff. It was rotten, eroded with wind and weather, turning to dust beneath his touch.

He inched lower, hoping that rock would provide a firmer surface, brushing aside the tall shoots as he reached the ledge bearing the bamboo. Tall poles a couple of inches thick covered with thorned leaves which dewed the back of his left hand with blood. Behind them, hidden by the foliage, gaped the open mouth of a cave.

Suddenly it filled with vicious life.

It came with a rush, a thing gleaming with chitin, mandibles open, faceted eyes reflecting the sun as if they had been rubies. A centipede-like insect three feet long nine inches thick, multiple legs covered with cruel spines which ripped and tore at Dumarest's arm as the mandibles reached to close on his throat.

Closing on his left forearm instead as he swung it up to block the attack.

The creature doubling to drive its sting into his face.

Dumarest felt the rasp of the body as he jerked his head aside, kicking so as to drive himself out and away from the ledge. Spinning, dropping, he reached for his knife, lifting it as the insect scrabbled at his arm, the sting slamming against his shoulder. Acid stung his cheek as he stabbed upward, the blade digging deep into the armored body. A blow with little result and he freed the knife and slashed instead, the keen edge cutting deep before the sting, crippling, cutting again to lop off the last few segments of the writhing body.

Hurt, maimed, the creature twisted, raking Dumarest with mandible and spines, then reared up to catch the rope and run up it. Halting, it began to tear at the plaited strands.

"Angado!" Once weakened, the rope would break and he would fall a mile to end as a bloody pulp on the scree. "Up, man! Up!"

A shout followed by a jerk which sent Dumarest crashing hard against the face of the cliff. Above him the insect slid down the rope, the upper half of its body twisting to take a new hold, to send the entire creature scuttling down toward Dumarest's head.

A moment and it was on him, mandibles tearing at his scalp, legs ripping at his eyes. Instinct drove the knife upward to cut, slash, stab at the ruby eyes, cut away the threshing legs. Ichor oozed from the lacerated body to dew him with odorous slime. Then, as Angado hauled at the rope, the thing fell away to drop, spinning, to the ground below.

"God!" Angado dropped the rope to help Dumarest as he climbed over the edge. "Your face! What the hell happened?"

His face tightened when, later, Dumarest told him. Water from a canteen had washed away the ichor and slime and an ampule of drugs had ended the pain from the acid-burn of bites and scratches. But nothing could have saved his eyes and the lacerations on his brows told how close the sting had come.

"A thing like that living in the cliff. You were lucky, Earl. But maybe it was a loner."

"No."

"It could have been. A freak of some kind." Angado wanted to be convinced. "Or maybe they only lurk near the edge."

Dumarest said, "It had a lair behind that clump of bamboo. My guess is that we'll find others like it wherever there is cover. Other things too-the cliff is riddled with holes and they can't all be natural. And don't forget the wind."

"What has that to do with it?"

"It blows from the ground out there to the cliff and it brings all sorts of things with it. Spores, seeds, insects, eggs, birds-anything which gets caught winds up here. Food, and where there's food there will be predators. I just happened to run into one."

Angado walked to the edge and looked over. The sun, now in its descent, threw golden light over the slope, painting it with a false warmth and gentleness.

Returning to where Dumarest sat, he said, "Aside from the insects could we climb down it?"

"With luck, maybe, but we'd need a hell of a lot of luck." Dumarest met his eyes. "With what I figure is lurking on the face it's impossible."

"So we're stuck up here."

"That's right. We're stuck-unless we can find another way down."

That night they saw lights, faint glimmers far in the distance, blooming to die as if born from a struggling fire that sputtered and fumed and roared into new and angry life.

"A camp," mused Angado. "I guess you're right, Earl. It has to be a camp."

"Maybe more than that."

"Hunters, maybe, or-" Angado blinked. "What?"

"Those reports I heard and the flash. The noises could have been sonic bangs high up and going away from us. If they had emanated at ground level we'd have run into them on the journey. The flash could have been from an Erhaft field."

"Lavender?" Angado shook his head. "A field is blue."

"Normally, yes, but the air could have colored it." Dumarest paused then added, "Or there could have been another reason. Do you know anything about generators?"

"You're talking about a malfunction in the phase effect resulting in a spectrum drop." Angado smiled with a flash of white teeth. "We studied chromatic analysis of the Erhaft field during my last semester at university. The Daley-Ash University of Space Flight," he added wryly. "I guess you could say I know something about generators."

"You surprise me."

"Why? Because I act the dilettante?" Angado shrugged. "I had an ambition when a child and tried to achieve it. I wanted to be someone who could do things. A doctor or an engineer, healing and building, even be an expert on something so I'd be respected. Family pride," he said bitterly. "A defense against family pressure. So I went to university and studied until I was told to stop wasting my time."

"So you called it a bad dream and ran from it? The necessity of having to make a decision?"

"Call it that." Angado was curt. "A family can be a prison, Earl. You live by rules not of your making. You conform to ideals established before you were born. Play along and everything's fine. Step out of line and-" His hand slapped the ground as if he were squashing an insect. "End of ambition. End of career. End of any pretense of freedom. So I sold out. Can you blame me?"

"That isn't my business. Could what I saw have been a ship?"

"It could and you know it. You've known it from the first." Hope animated the younger man's face. "That camp! If it was a ship you saw and the field was showing phase malfunction then it must have made an emergency landing. Which means-" He rose and stared at where they had seen the fire. "It's still here, Earl. Still here. A way out of this damned trap!"

"If we can get to it."

"What?" Angado slumped. "I'd forgotten. That blasted cliff. How the hell can we get down it?"

"Tell me."

"What's there to tell? We can't climb down. We can't slide or-" He broke off, shaking his head. "No. The terminal velocity would be too great. Even with air-drogues we'd never make it and that's assuming we can find material to build sledges and a slope shallow enough to try it. I must have been crazy to think about it. So what else is left?"

Dumarest said, "How about flying?"

"Hang gliders?" Angado was quick to assess the possibility. "No. It could be done but we haven't the materials. The wing would have to be strong and so would the covering. If either went we'd be dead." He frowned and said, "But maybe a kite? Two kites, big ones, one for each of us? Earl, how can we build a couple of kites?"

"From bamboo," said Dumarest. "That can be got from the ledge. I'll go down at first light and get it, it'll be safe enough now. The sacs will serve for covering and we have wire to lash things tight. Ropes, too-we'd better get on making what we need." He glanced at the sky, the stars were misted with cloud. "We want to be ready when the wind starts to blow."

The kites were box-shaped, twice the height of a man, following aerodynamic principles learned by Angado at the university. Dumarest checked the lashings, using the handle of the axe to twist them tight, the flat to test for security. The plastic sacs, opened out and cut to shape formed the major part of the covering while broad strips of various materials from the clothing provided the rest. Empty containers, voided ampules, the rubbish Angado had resented carrying-all went into the final construction. Proof of Dumarest's knowledge of the wild where even a pin was an item of inestimable value and a battered empty can an object beyond price.

"Catch hold!" He threw the end of a rope at Angado. "Pull!" He jerked his own end as the man obeyed. "Again! Once more! Good! That should do it!"

The final rope and he knotted it firmly in place before attaching it to his harness. Each checked the other and both looked grotesque with thick rolls of material bound around shins, thighs, heads, hips, arms and chest. Padding to absorb the shock of impact when they landed.

If they landed, thought Angado grimly. If the wind didn't smash them back against the cliff and the kites provided enough support to break the speed of their fall. If the ropes didn't break. The coverings rip free. The bamboo framework shatter. The scree not too hard or spiked with hidden rocks.

Doubts which didn't seem to affect Dumarest.

He said, "When the wind hits the cliff it turns up and back on itself like a cresting wave. I've been studying how grass acts in the thermals. Throw it out far enough and it doesn't come back. Once the wind catches your kite keep it heading out. If it doesn't, pull it back and try again. Got it?"

Simple instructions but not so easy to follow despite the guidelines attached to the framework. In theory the kites could be guided to a certain degree. But now, facing the acid test, Angado wasn't so sure.

He said, "Earl, I've been thinking. Maybe-"

"Now!" snapped Dumarest. "Now!" Then, as Angado hesitated, "Damn it, man! Move!"

The whip-crack of command which he obeyed, lifting the kite and running with it to the edge, muscles cracking beneath the strain. A moment of teetering then the wind took over, catching the kite, lifting it, jerking Angado off balance and off the edge of the cliff to leave him dangling in his harness.

Dumarest watched then followed, knowing the impossibility of following his instructions, knowing too they had been given for the other's benefit. The gamble was risky enough without adding an utter helplessness to the equation. Angado had been lucky, the wind which had caught him had been kind, Dumarest's wasn't so cooperative.

He grunted as the wind veered, slamming him against the cliff, the kite jerking him away again, a clinging vine trailing from his boot. He kicked free as again the wind gusted, the kite bobbing, dropping, soaring upward in a complex motion which blurred his eyes and filled his mouth with the taste of vomit. Weakness he ignored as he fought vertigo, tugging at his line to shorten the distance between himself and the kite, hanging, swaying like a pendulum beneath it as the wind roared past his ears.

The sound was too loud-he was falling too fast. He tugged at the guidelines, discarding them as the kite refused to respond. Instead he threw his body in a widening swing, forcing the kite to react to his movements. It tilted, straightened, was captured by the uprushing air. The roaring died and, suddenly, he drifted in calm.

The cliff was well to one side, a soaring wall of blotched and mottled dirt and stone. The other kite was closer to the wall and, like his own, acted as a parachute. Larger and they would have lifted their burdens but it was enough they had carried them clear and lowered them slow.

Five hundred feet above the ground one of the ropes snapped with the sound of tearing paper.

Dumarest swung, hanging on the single remaining rope, his weight pulling the kite to one side, tilting it, forcing it to lose height and lift. The roaring started again in his ears and he gripped the rope, climbing up it, catching the inner structure of the kite and hanging from it as the ground rushed up toward him. A moment of strain with the force of the wind fighting against his arms, muscles burning, cracking with the effort to hold on, then a side wise swoop and the sudden jarring rasp as the kite slammed against the wall of the cliff.

A glancing blow, repeated, the third time shattering the structure and leaving nothing but a mass of splintered bamboo, shreds of plastic, wire, frayed and disintegrating rope.

From it Dumarest rolled, falling through a clump of bushes, over thickly tufted grass, to half-fall, half-slide over the fan of scree. To come to rest in a cloud of dirt among a scatter of stones.

"Earl!" Angado came running. He had landed safely and close. Now he knelt, turning Dumarest over, the anxiety on his face turning to relief as he sat upright. "Are you hurt?"

"I don't think so." There was no blood, no ache of broken bones, just numbness and the promise of bruises. The padding had done its job. "You?"

"Fine."

Dumarest nodded and climbed to his feet. The padding made movement awkward and he cut it away, leaving the scraps where they had fallen. Stretching, he took cautious strides. Luck and experience had been with him. One had thrown him into the bushes the other had made him fall like a baby or a drunk, not fighting gravity, yielding to it instead, muscles lax and supple.

"We made it!" Angado drew in his breath as he stared at the towering wall of the cliff. "By God, we made it! All we have to do now is get to the ship. Which way do we head, Earl?"

Dumarest looked at his wrist compass, the face broken, the dial twisted, the interior useless.