The Long War

48

THE BEAGLE AND the kobold approached, walking out of the dusty distance.

In their rough camp, Jansson and Sally stood, wary. As the creatures drew near, Jansson was very aware of an emptiness at her belt where her cop-issue Stepper box ought to be. The beagle, the dog-man, had confiscated it on the day they’d arrived. And so she, at least, without Sally’s aid, had been stuck here ever since, on this peculiar world with its strange inhabitants.

It was the first time they’d been visited in the week or so that they’d been here, since they’d been met in the Rectangles world and brought to this Earth a couple of dozen steps further West – to a world full of trolls, as Sally said she could feel, hear, as soon as they arrived. The beagles were waiting, they were told, for the return of some kind of ruler from . . . someplace else. It would be this ruler who would deal with the humans.

Jansson supposed it gave them time to get their bearings, for her to recover somewhat from the journey so far. Even that first jaunt, from Rectangles to here, had been a grotesque experience, because the beagle who had met them couldn’t step; it had had to be carried on the back of the squat, ugly humanoid Sally had called a ‘kobold’.

It had all been a rush of strangeness for them both. Even Sally, Jansson had learned, the great explorer of the Long Earth, had known nothing of this place before being brought here, lured by the gossip of the kobolds. To Sally this world had been just another Joker, just another desert world in a band of such worlds which, apparently, had lost much of their water through some calamity during the turbulent epoch of planetary formation. On such a world geological activity was going to be reduced, life restricted . . . That was the theory. In fact, as Jansson was learning, on many Jokers there were habitable refuges.

On this world there was an island of green, of moisture – from what the kobold had said, Sally had guessed it could be the size of Europe. Unnoticed by dismissive previous explorers, including Joshua and Sally, who had come rushing through this world too hastily. Unnoticed by the teams of researchers who had followed that first expedition to Rectangles: they had been Datum-raised workers with Datum-trained expectations, who thought in terms of one world thick, and never looked stepwise.

Well, here they were, in a world that hosted these dogs, these strange sapients – and, evidently, the trolls, in great concentrations.

For a long interval there was silence. The dog beasts seemed to like to stare, to study, to think before speaking; the grammar of their interactions was not like the human. Jansson and Sally just stood there, waiting. The kobold had a wounded arm, Jansson noticed now, roughly bandaged with a soiled rag. He cackled, evidently enjoying the moment.

The trolls who’d travelled with them didn’t seem bothered in the slightest. Mary sat on a knoll, humming a tune that was naggingly familiar to Jansson, while Ham happily raked the ground with his strong fingers, periodically popping grubs into his mouth. As if, Jansson thought, being approached by a bipedal dog wearing a ray gun happened every day.

The beagle stood before the women, eyes unblinking, that mobile wet nose quivering as, evidently, he smelled them. He must have been nearly seven feet tall, and he towered over both Jansson and Sally. But that, and the ray gun, weren’t the only reasons he was so intimidating, Jansson realized. There was something fluidly animal about him, a sense of honed perfection, right down to the way his fine fur coated his flesh in smooth streamlined layers. And there was intelligence in his eyes, a bright hard directed intelligence.

His teeth, eyes, ears, muzzle, nose were all very dog-like, even though, Jansson saw, the overall shape of his skull, with a bulging brow, might have been humanoid. His face sometimes looked human, sometimes wolf-like, like a shifting hologram. His ears were too sharp, his eyes too far apart, his grin too wide, his nose too flat with that blackened tip . . . And his eyes, yes, it was like looking into the eyes of a wolf. He made Jansson feel shabby, incomplete. But there was also something unreal about him, as if he were a movie CGI special effect. He just didn’t fit into Jansson’s cosy, parochial, Datum-nurtured consciousness.

He couldn’t step. And presumably none of his kind could, either. Jansson had to cling to that thought, that she could do something he couldn’t—

She coughed, and shivered, a wave of weakness passing over her.

The beagle turned on her. ‘Your name?’

His language was distorted, a mix of dog-like growls and whines. Hrr-your-rrh ne-rr-mmhh? Yet he clearly spoke English, his words understandable. Another astonishing conceptual leap for an ex-cop like Jansson to absorb.

Jansson tried to stand straight. ‘Monica Jansson. Formerly Lieutenant, Madison PD.’

The beagle cocked his head on one side, evidently puzzled. He turned to Sally. ‘You?’

‘Sally Linsay.’

The beagle raised his fore-limb, his arm, and pointed at his chest. Jansson saw that his paw, his hand, had four extended finger-like appendages, nothing like a thumb, and he wore a kind of leathery glove over his palm. Protection for when he went on all fours, perhaps. ‘My name,’ he said now. ‘Snowy.’

Sally clearly tried not to, but burst out laughing.

Jansson turned to the kobold. ‘Snowy?’

The kobold grinned nervously. ‘Other pathless-ss ones came befo-rre . . . Gave na-mme.’

Sally said, ‘And I know your name. Finn McCool, right?’ She glanced at Jansson. ‘One of the smarter of his breed. Good with humans. I might have known you’d be involved in this, chasing some angle.’

The kobold just grinned. ‘Josh-shua.’

Sally scowled. ‘What about Joshua?’

But the kobold would not reply.

Snowy studied them. ‘You,’ he said to Sally, ‘crotch-stink human-nn.’

‘Thanks.’

‘Smell same as befor-rre. Like othe-hhrs of your kind. But-tt you . . .’

He came closer to Jansson. She tried not to flinch as, his eyes half-closed, he sniffed her breath. He smelled of wet fur and a kind of musk.

‘St-hhrange. Sick. You smell sick-hrr.’

‘Very perceptive,’ murmured Jansson.

He stepped back, raised his head and howled, a sharp, supremely loud noise that made Jansson wince, and Sally cover her ears. It was answered within a few seconds by another howl coming from the east.

Snowy turned and pointed that way. ‘My Den. Smell of my litter-hrr. Name, Eye of Hunter-rrh. Cart coming, ca-rrhy you. Granddaughter of Den, name Petra. Sh-she see you. Granddaughter back from Den of Mother, fa-hhr from here.’

Sally asked, ‘Does this Granddaughter know about us?’

‘Not yet. Surp-hhrrise by Snowy.’ He pulled back his lips to reveal very canine teeth in a kind of smile. ‘Rewar-rrd for Snowy, for gi-ffft.’ He sounded breathless, agitated.

Sally murmured to Jansson, ‘Don’t look down.’

‘Why not?’

‘If you do you’ll see how he’s already anticipating the reward he’s going to get from this Granddaughter, whoever she is.’

Snowy walked away, to Jansson’s relief, a big priapic animal backing off and looking out for the cart.

The kobold was still here, grinning at them.

Jansson said wearily, ‘So am I allowed to ask questions?’

Sally laughed. ‘If you can figure out where to begin.’

Jansson jabbed a finger at McCool. ‘I know of your kind. The police agencies across the Low Earths keep records of you. Partial sightings, fragmentary reports, scratchy CCTV images . . . What are you doing here?’

McCool shrugged. ‘Hel-pp you. For price.’ Prei-sss.

‘Of course, for a price,’ Sally said. ‘I knew that the kobolds were always going to know where the trolls are hiding out, Monica.’

‘So you went to them and asked—’

‘They all know each other. They swap information. The trolls have their long call. With the kobolds it’s more like the long snitch. Anything they know is swapped around and sold to the highest bidder. So I followed the rumour trail, one scrawny kobold to the next. At last I found one who told me to bring Mary to the Rectangles. And then – well, you know the rest. From there we were brought here, to this arid world, this Joker, full of these dog-like sapients.’

‘Beagles,’ McCool said. ‘Called beagles-ss.’

Jansson asked, ‘Who by? Why beagles?’

‘Who? Other pathless-ss ones, here before. They call them beagles-ss.’

Sally said, ‘Somebody’s having a joke. I bet we can blame Charles Darwin for that.’

Finn McCool shrugged. It was an unnatural motion, Jansson thought, less like a human gesture than a monkey performing a circus trick.

Jansson asked, ‘And is that how he got his “name”? Snowy?’

Another shrug. ‘Human na-mme. Not true name. Beagles-ss not speak true na-mme to human-nn. Kobolds not ss-peak true name to pathless-ss ones.’

‘How is it he speaks English at all? Learned from humans?’

‘No. Kobolds here first. Kobolds sell beagles ss-tuff.’

Jansson nodded. ‘You already spoke English. So the beagles were the first to learn your language rather than the other way around.’

‘Beagles are smarter than kobolds, then,’ Sally said with a satisfied grin.

McCool looked away, edgy, nervous.

There was a plume of dust, coming from the east. Snowy spotted it, sniffed the air, howled again. There was an answering howl from off in the distance, and what sounded like a throaty caw to Jansson, like the cry of some tremendous bird. Jansson shivered again, having no real idea what she was getting into.

She turned back to McCool. ‘Tell me one more thing. That beagle, Snowy, was carrying a stone-tipped spear – and a ray gun.’

Sally grunted. ‘Actually it looked like a compact laser projector.’

‘We just got here. But I don’t see any cities, any planes in the sky. How did some kind of Stone Age warrior get a laser gun?’

Sally said to McCool, ‘From some other world, stepwise. From you kobolds. Right? So is that your angle here?’

The kobold grinned again. ‘Beagles not ss-tep. Smart but no toolss. Only ss-tone. Buy tool-ss from us-ss, all kinda stuff.’

‘Including a weapon,’ Sally murmured, ‘that looked like it came from a society more advanced even than Datum Earth. Where did you get it, monkey boy?’

‘Dug up,’ Finn McCool said simply, and he grinned, and would say no more.

That approaching dust plume resolved into a cart, a heavy frame of wood running on four solid wooden wheels that seemed to be rimmed with rusty iron. Another beagle, perhaps slighter than Snowy, stood on the cart’s bed, wielding reins. Taller than Jansson, taller even than Snowy, the bird things had fat feathered bodies with stubby wings, muscular legs, feet tipped with claws like sickles, long pillar-like necks, and heads that looked all beak. Yet they were harnessed up and appeared obedient.

‘That would be an astonishing sight,’ Jansson murmured. ‘A dog riding a cart. Even if it wasn’t being drawn by two huge birds. If you filmed that and put it on the outernet it would be a comedy sensation.’

Sally touched Jansson’s arm, surprisingly sympathetic. ‘Just let the strangeness wash over you, Lieutenant Jansson. Come on . . .’

Hastily they packed up their few bits of gear.

The cart slowed to a stop. The beagle driver jumped to the ground, and she – nude save for a kind of belt of pockets, you could see she was female – greeted Snowy. They ran around each other briefly, and Snowy even dropped for a moment to all fours, wagging a stub of tail.

‘The females are dominant,’ Sally murmured.

‘What?’

‘Look at the two of them. He’s more pleased to see her than the other way around. Something worth noting.’

‘Hmm. Maybe you’re jumping to conclusions.’

Sally snorted. ‘You could learn all you need to know about human males from one miserable specimen. Why not the same here? Listen, we need to find an angle of our own.’

‘We came here to help Mary. We came for the trolls.’

‘Yeah. But we weren’t expecting all this complication. We’ll play for time – and stay alive in the process. Just remember, we can always step out, if it gets bad enough. I can carry you. These dogs can’t follow, we know that now.’

With the greeting done, the female beagle approached the humans. She pointed to her own chest. ‘Li-Li. Call me Li-Li.’ She turned to the cart. ‘Ride to Eye of Hunte-hhr.’

Sally nodded. ‘Thank you. We need to bring the trolls we came with . . .’

But Li-Li had already turned away, and was beckoning to the trolls, singing a kind of warbled melody. Without any fuss Mary stood, picked up Ham and set him on her shoulder, and clambered aboard the cart.

The humans followed, with Finn McCool. Snowy snapped the reins, the bird beasts cawed like pigeons on steroids, and the cart jolted into motion, nearly knocking Jansson over. There were no seats. Jansson held on to the rough-finished wall of the cart, wondering how far it was to this city, and if she could make it all the way without collapsing.

Li-Li approached Jansson. Again Jansson had to endure a wet dog-like nose sniffing at her mouth, armpits, crotch. ‘Sick,’ Li-Li said without ceremony.

Jansson forced a smile. ‘My body’s going wrong, and I’m full of drugs. No wonder I smell strange to you.’

Li-Li took Jansson’s hands in hers. Li-Li wore no gloves, unlike Snowy. Her fingers were long, human-like in that regard, but her palms had leathery pads on the underside, like canine paws. ‘My jj-rrh-ob. Care for sick and injured. You lucky.’

‘How?’ Sally asked sharply. ‘How were we lucky?’

‘Snowy found-dd you.’ She glanced up at the big beagle at the reins. ‘Not ve-hhry clever but big spir-rrit. Always truth-tells. B-hhrave. Good hunter, but kind. Takes you back to city, see Granddaughter Petra. Some hunter-hhrs, just take back head. Or ear-rrs.’

Sally and Jansson exchanged a glance. Jansson said, ‘So we’re lucky we got found by a beagle that didn’t just kill us outright.’

‘There’s no higher morality,’ Sally said. ‘By the way,’ she added more softly, ‘I just jumped to another conclusion.’

‘What?’

‘She said Snowy’s truthful. That implies that others aren’t. These super-dogs know how to lie.’

Jansson nodded. ‘Noted.’