The Unforsaken Hiero

VIII. ANY PORT IN A STORM

The hoppers, even the picked beasts of the Royal Guard, were very tired. All the interminable day, they had sped from one end of the battle line to the other as the guard followed its royal mistress. The princess had been everywhere, her gilded mail and bright plumes shining like an oriflamme of war as she rallied lagging spearmen here and sent fresh lancers there. Each threatened point had seen her, cheered her to the marrow, and then fought the harder as a result.

But the day was lost, nonetheless. The royal army, outnumbered and with its flanks turned, had been forced to withdraw. The rebel duke, or one of his advisors, had planned shrewdly and moved far more quickly than either Luchare or the king had believed possible. Also, the cunning Amibale had used several unexpected tricks, either through his own sharp wits or through Unclean guidance. Joseato was in it somewhere, but Amibale, Luchare reflected glumly, was quite clever enough on his own. A revolt of the beggars and thieves, allied with disgruntled petty shopkeepers, had erupted in the city as the army was setting out. It had been put down quickly and the ringleaders promptly hanged, but this cost both time and lives. As a result, when the two armies finally met, twenty miles south of D’alwah City, the royal troops were already tired from street fighting and had sustained losses.

Amibale, who to do him justice was brave, had brought not only the troops of his dukedom but also hordes of savages, some of unknown races, to assist. A particular menace was the swarm of small, pallid men used as skirmishers, who fired clouds of poisoned arrows from both bows and blowguns. And there was worse. The Unclean wizards were coming out into the open at last. A regiment of the ape mutants, the Hairy Howlers, stormed against one wing, while a mob of shrieking, chattering Man-rats assaulted the other.

Moreover, so quickly had Amibale moved that the full resources available to the royal army simply had not been there on time. The Mu’aman infantry, summoned from their western plains, had not arrived. Would they come late or not at all? Had they, too, been rotted with treason? The village militia and the frontier guards had not had time to draw back, either, nor had most of the hardy boatmen of the bays on the Lantik, stern fighters and badly needed.

So the battle had been fought and lost with the household troops, plus the personal armies of the loyal nobility who lived near the capital. Indeed, at one point the center had almost broken under a heavy onslaught, and only the unexpected arrival of Count Ghiftah Hamili, charging in person at the head of his two lancer squadrons, had saved the stricken field. Any doubts that Luchare might have had about the silent count were cleared on the spot as, fighting like a demon at the front of his hoppers, he drove back Amibale’s infantry.

But it was not enough. Sullenly, unbroken but unable to maintain the fight, the royal army fell back, covering its flanks and snapping at the enemy as it did so. There was no choice. By nightfall, Luchare was conferring with her commanders while the battered troops were being entrenched on the outskirts of D’alwah City itself. There was still no word from the outlying districts, and rumors of a new and dreadful attack from within had started in the city. There was little talk and no laughter at all in the tired ranks that night.

Around a tiny fire, four silent figures crouched. The fire was burning in the mammoth crotch of a tree so vast it could have shaded a small town unaided. A fifth person, posted as a sentinel, peered from a branch a little higher up. Far below, out of sight even in the daylight, hidden by innumerable leaves, vines, and limbs, lay the nighted swamp from which the tree had sprung, ages in the past.

Hiero was conferring with M’reen, B’uorgh, and Za’reekh, a powerful young warrior. On watch above them, Ch’uirsh, the other youngster, could join in the mingled thoughts when he chose. Usually the two young males were silent when their elders spoke, but they sometimes disagreed and they had the right to be heard. There was a mental silence now, for they were all listening to the sounds of the morass many hundreds of feet below.

A hideous bellow erupted upward, croaking and guttural, but so enormous in sheer volume as to make the very perfumed air of the trees seem to shiver. All the myriad forest noises appeared to hush at the terrible cry.

What is it, Hiero? B’uorgh had learned as had the others, that their new friend could tap the minds of many other beings, while the catfolk were restricted to those of their own species. Above the man’s head a great, scented blossom waved, giving off a wonderful aroma as he concentrated. Once more the monstrous, raging grunt reverberated up through the foliage. At length, the Metz relaxed again and smiled.

I don’t know. An Elevener, one of our friends whom I have told you of, well, one of them might be able to find out. They specialize in all life, everything that breathes, you know. I can’t distinguish between lots of the lower types, the ones with little or no brain. This may be a reptile, like a snake or lizard. But I rather think it’s an amphibian, something like a frog or a salamander. They have even less brain than the reptiles. I get a feeling of blind, fumbling anger on a very low level. I met something like that once before, up in the Palood, the great marshes of the North. Their intelligence is so sluggish you can’t detect them at all. At least, I can’t.

A frog! If that’s a frog, it could jump up here. The thought came down from Ch’uirsh.

Nothing that makes that much noise could jump anywhere, M’reen retorted. It might just push the tree over, though. She shuddered appreciatively, the firelight catching the smooth muscles under her dappled coat. I’m glad we can travel up here and not in that muck down there.

Hiero decided not to mention that some of the incredible frog monsters of the Palood could jump very well. Anyway, he felt that it was not one of them, making the night hideous, but some vast, crawling thing that lurked in the mud and water at the bases of the great trees.

The little party had been on its way north for over two weeks now, and the past two days had been spent traversing the swamp. The jungle at the foot of the giant tree boles was quite dangerous enough, so much so that they had always to be on the alert, by day or night. But when they encountered the beginnings of this huge bog, it was an obvious impossibility to continue. They had seen tracks on its edge which made any such idea unthinkable. The catfolk were runners of the open plains, and they knew nothing of this shrouded murk and its inhabitants. The trees went on as if the dark water at their feet were simply a new form of soil, so the travelers simply did the logical thing. They went aloft. They lost time, of course. Sometimes the vined highways and the mighty limbs came to a dead end, and they all had to backtrack. But Hiero always knew where his home lay, his built-in compass never ceasing to function. He could get a rude sighting on the sun through the leaves as well, and thus their course, to the north, stayed pretty constant.

There were other advantages. The cat people and Hiero were good climbers. Then, too, the really monstrous things, such as whatever wallowed far below at the moment, were not apt to be climbers at all. The air was cool and fresh, and there was plenty of game, in the form of unwary birds and mammals. Only that afternoon, B’uorgh had scurried up a nearby trunk and neatly cut the throat of a large nesting bird. It and its half-grown young had made an excellent dinner, with plenty left over for the morrow.

Nothing in this life was completely safe, of course. Once they had been forced to scamper for their lives when a nest of tree vipers had all leaped or slithered at them. At another point a colony of malignant-looking apes, far too much like the Hairy Howlers for Hiero’s liking, had followed them a long way, obviously nerving themselves up to an open attack. They were big, stump-tailed brutes, glossy black and with savage, naked, green faces and horrendous fangs. But just as Hiero had been about to kill one and risk losing his spear, the whole gibbering crew reached the end of some obscure and invisible boundary.

Hiero’s group hastened away, leaving behind the barking and chattering mob in the sea of verdant leaves. The two young males Were furious at being chivied along in this manner and pleaded to be allowed to go back and wipe out the horde, but B’uorgh’s coughed orders put an end to that nonsense at once, and they subsided.

The man realized how lucky he was. He certainly had not been looking forward to his lonely but inevitable journey through the incredibly dangerous southern wood. For one thing, he had to sleep at times; for another, he had been there before, though in another part, and had some idea of the perils which lay hidden in the depths of the giant trees. He had been taken wholly by surprise, therefore, when the old Speaker called him to a sudden meeting and blandly informed him that four of her people would go with him. The war chief, the young Speaker-to-be, and the two younger warriors were all volunteers, but also came with her full consent and approval.

You go into great peril, as great as any you have been through, we think. Hiero had informed the tribe, through necessity, of some of his recent adventures and had not even been sure that they believed him. The art of telling tall tales was well developed among this strange people.

The soft-furred hand laid its naked palm on his as the Speaker continued. Hiero, you go to fight the ancient enemy of us all. Your she fights for you far away, and so do others. You are our friend. If the defilers, the cub-killers, the naked-faced mind-warpers, if they should be the victors, how long would we be safe, we whom they have forgotten, perhaps? Not long, we all think. We are few in number, and none outside knows of us as yet, save only you. But how long would thai last if the enemy with the terrible machines you tell of were to conquer all who now oppose them? No, we must help, for your errand, even though we do not fully comprehend it, is of the utmost importance. It must be so, for you do not lie and you have shown us how they hate you and have tried to kill you, not once but many times. You must be one of their chief est foes, if not the most important. Friends are for help, and you shall have ours. This chewed-up, old scar-fur of a B’uorgh can be replaced easily enough. The doughty individual in question simply purred; he knew what condition he moreover, looked it.

The Speaker sighed mentally. I would come myself to see new things and learn much of the outer world I will never know. But I can send M’reen. She will be my eyes and ears. l can train another, should she be lost, though she is a good mind. The two young males are idiots, like all males, both the young and the older. Still, they are among the best hunters in the pack. They can help guard you. And M’reen has the secret of the Wind of Death!

It had been hard to thank them all, especially since he alone knew, or at least had some idea, of what they were getting into. And they had done another thing without being asked, which made him feel even more warmly about them. They had sworn, quite simply, to leave the humans out in the villages alone and, while remaining secret, to kill no more of them for any reason. No more babies would be removed as pets, nor would solitary hunters be hounded to a terrified doom. This was a great concession.

Now here they were, Hiero mused, watching the blunt faces with their brows black-barred and lively, lambent eyes, the rippling muscles, and the ivory claws stretching as their owners eased their limbs. Who would have thought this only two weeks ago? For indeed they had been a fantastic help. It was very hard to winnow out thoughts in this life-infested jungle; though he did his best, not all inimical creatures were detectable in time. The great ape-things were very intelligent, and he, concentrating on lower carnivores and other predacious forms of existence, had missed them completely. It was the young Za’reekh who had heard the rustle of branches, unswayed by treetop breezes, and thus had warned them in time to turn from the ambush. The catfolk had no noses worth speaking of; indeed, Hiero’s was far better. But their eyes and ears were fantastic and, in the often dim light, invaluable. It was M’reen who had heard the whispering rush of the oncoming brood of vipers and thus had turned them back, fortunately to a series of broad, flat limbs.

Their aid was well worth having, and they were good company too, though Ch’uirsh was going to get nailed one of these days for his practical jokes! Finding a giant worm from a bromeliad growth on one’s chest in the small hours of the night was a bit much. The priest-warrior grinned to himself. He had flung the supposed serpent off with a yelp of horror before even getting a good look at it. B’uorgh, also wakened, had wanted to scalp the young hunter, but M’reen had given him a good talking-to instead. A Speaker-to-be, even a young one, in a female rage, had made Ch’uirsh’s ears go back in instant regret for his folly. Hiero contented himself with a very brief lecture on the idiocy of frightening people who had a lot of real dangers on their minds. And that was that. It had been funny, though.

I wonder where we are, B’uorgh sent, after a companionable silence, while they listened to the monster in the slime below, now retreating noisily. Can this sea, this mighty water, be far off, do you think, Hiero? I have viewed it in your mind, but frankly, I find it hard to believe, even so. So much water in one place!

Oh, it’s there, the man answered. We have to cross it somehow. I simply have to get back to the real war, to find out what my own people are doing, to say nothing of the Unclean. I don’t know if the weapon that I found, the machine that thinks for all—this was as close to describing the computer idea as he could get—ever arrived in my country. I don’t know if my country is even still defending itself I don’t know if any messages have come from the South, from, my she and her country. The only thing I do know is that going all the way around the edge of the Inland Sea would take many months, assuming that we ever got there at all. We have to cross it and cross it fast.

There was a silence again as the cat minds considered yet once more all the marvelous new ideas. The great waters alone were wild enough in conception for folk who only knew the lazy little rivers of the savannas. But the idea of going on things that floated, like sticks on a rivulet! It was frightening, yes, but also wonderful.

These boats, these ships, I understand, I think, M’reen sent. But the way they move! I can understand that if many people put sticks in the water that push, the boat-thing moves forward. But that the wind itself can make the boat move, that is almost beyond any belief For perhaps the fiftieth time, Hiero tried to explain what sails were and what it was that they did. The real joke, which he could not share, was that he was sure that the cat people would make marvelous sailors! They had no fear at all of heights and moved up and down smooth branches, well—like cats. He felt sure that a crew of trained catmen would rival the finest human sailors in existence. Probably they would need little or no training, either, once the principles were understood. Of course, there was a possible problem of seasickness, but he doubted that such a small thing would stop his friends for very long. As they fell into a drowsy slumber, he was still chuckling to himself at the thought of a great barque, such as The Ravished Bride, her rigging full of flitting, dancing figures, like spotted sprites.

The following day brought Hiero to a sudden halt. It was midaf-ternoon and they were moving rapidly along a highway of the world aloft, a series of interlaced branches of great size, almost as easy to run on as a town street. The man suddenly held up one hand, and the others stopped in their tracks as the message penetrated.

Hiero’s mind had gone roving ahead in its usual manner, but he had been pushing it a bit harder and farther than he normally did. Then he realized they were already near the Inland Sea. There could be no other explanation for the void in the life auras he was accustomed to gathering into his head. The vast, teeming mass of sheer life which made up the collective biota of the titanic forest suddenly halted. There was a clear limit beyond which, with sharp finality, all surface life ceased. All normal surface life, that was!

Motioning the others to stillness, he crouched on the branch and listened with all his mental ability, for he was operating his power at extreme range. He was sensing men, men of so-called civilization, for the first time in months. And they were very much the wrong kind of men!

He was detecting the crew of an Unclean ship! No other explanation made any sense. They were closely grouped physically; that he could tell with ease. And they were out in the emptiness that he knew from the past, which could only mean the sea. The sea had many forms of life, but they did not as a rule operate on its surface, certainly not on bands of mental energy used by humans. And none of the natural forms of the great freshwater ocean would be likely to own an Unclean mind shield! One assortment of people, of whatever stock he could not tell, had such. He had learned in his flight from the North to detect these things when they were being used to send messages. In their closed or defensive condition, they revealed nothing. But the creature of the enemy was using this one to send. This left him open to detection by Hiero and, more than that, enabled the Metz to read the message. What was being sent was most interesting.

None of our ships have been sighted. Not even a trader of the common scum. It is as if the coast west of Neeyana had been swept clean somehow. I have received messages only from yourself. Suggest that a Brother be sent in one of the secret ships to investigate. We are two days’ sail from Neeyana, but we are hampered by bad winds. There is a strong feeling among both the officers and the crew that something very funny is going on. We should have sighted the front-runners of the spring trade by now, but have seen nothing. We return to port unless I receive further orders. Message ends. Sulkas.

Hiero listened intently with every fiber of his senses, but could detect no answer. If there were one, it must be coming on some wavelength too attenuated, possibly by distance, for him to reach. But he rather thought not. Whoever Sulkas was, he was no member of the Unclean Brotherhood. The mind, though intelligent, was not of the same caliber, nor was it of the same “feel.” This was some trusted servant, a pirate, perhaps, like the late Bald Roke, whom Hiero and Gimp had killed. While the catfolk chatted quietly among themselves, the priest settled down to try to analyze what he had heard.

The message had probably been sent at a fixed time. No reply was thought necessary for the present. Clearly, the Unclean, whom he knew controlled the port of Neeyana on the southern coast of the sea, were uneasy about something. This vessel, which had a crew of no more than a dozen, was sent out as a scout. The crew had found nothing save an empty ocean, and this made them in turn uneasy, for it should not have been so, not at this time of the year. The report had gone to home base, to Neeyana, for further action. A suggestion had been made that one of the Brothers, a robed wizard of the Unclean, should be sent on one of the “secret ships.”

Hiero had no trouble guessing what was meant. He had been a prisoner on one of those secret ships, powered by some force he did not as yet understand, but of which he had many suspicions. He was reasonably sure, as was Brother Aldo of the Eleventh Brotherhood, that the Unclean had atomics! Both men felt that the metal vessels they had encountered were driven by the powers of the atom, the shunned, the abhorred, the unspeakable! In their hidden laboratories, the scientists of the Unclean had wrought many horrors. They had bred mutated animals as slaves, as they had tried to do with the cat people. But this was the Ultimate Crime. This was the final horror of The Death, something so awful that normal humanity shrank from even contemplating it.

Hiero remembered their group thrill of nausea when he, Lu-chare, Aldo, and the bear Gorm had first glimpsed the buried cavern of the past, where the great, plastic-shrouded machines had lain, the dispatchers of the ancient terror throughout the world. Aldo, the lover of all life, had almost fainted.

As Hiero sat now, brooding over what he had learned, his determination hardened. The Unclean were going to perish, root and branch, down to the last serf, the merest acolyte in the most minor degree. This was his mission, and he would not fail.

At length, he turned to his fellow venturers. He knew what he wanted to do, but it might prove a trifle hard to explain. Yet he must make the attempt.

We must be just south of the main road from the west to a city held by our enemies. One old road runs from the southeast to the northwest, springing from many other roads far away in the South. We must have been moving roughly parallel to it, though a goodish way off. It is the only way from the east to the port of Neeyana, at least through the forest. West of Neeyana there are other roads and eventually, I think, also more open country, at least in part, but I have never been there or examined detailed maps of that region, except in the most casual way. The shores are very dangerous, and most traffic goes by ship.

He explained further what he had just been doing. There was an enemy vessel present out on the waters, and they must all be very, very careful from now on. If the Unclean ship were no more than two days’ sail from the harbor of the foe, then there would soon be contact with someone, probably a someone they had no wish to meet unawares.

We must guard our minds, he went on. Use your speech aloud to one another and talk with me only if urgent. You people use an odd mental band and not one likely to be constantly watched, which is good. But the Unclean have many servants who are not human and with whom they must speak, so be careful! Also, the nonhumans watch and listen, as well as send messages on their own account. We must go like shadows from here on. Something strange out on the sea seems to have disturbed our enemies. I have no idea what it is, but anything that bothers them is likely to be in our favor.

The catfolk had no trouble understanding him, though they grew wildly excited at the thought of actually coming into contact with the legendary wizard lords, whose crimes had been instilled into each of them in their youth. When Hiero explained that he had no real plans other than somehow to steal a small vessel and escape with it, they seemed to feel that this would prove easy—a simple matter of overpowering whoever stood in their way.

I will loose the Wind of Death on them. Then we will cut their throats! This was M’reen, tapping the pouch which hung at her belt. It took a while for Hiero to quiet them down, to explain the numbers of the Unclean and their servants, and to make sure they would do nothing rash, but would follow his orders. After a while, he felt sure of them. The first rush of hatred would not make them behave in an irresponsible way.

They continued on for the remainder of the day with redoubled caution, using hand signals when they wanted to tell Hiero something and conversing in their own purring murmur among themselves.

That night they camped on another natural platform. After Hiero had grilled his share of the meat, they put out the fire, remote though the chance was that it might be observed. Water had never been a problem to date; not only did the tree crotches often hold it in quantity, but many of the large, epiphytic plants contained small pools as well.

As the catfolk dozed through the dark hours, the man. continued to reach out with his thoughts into the night, not only in the direction they were moving but on either side as well. He was beginning, if his senses were operating in a correct manner, to feel what he thought was the town of Neeyana, a way off to the north and east of their present position. He could not read any individual minds, but the sensation of grouped humanity gave off a feeling almost of heat in his head. He was fairly sure he was right.

It was not in his original plans to approach the place at all, at least not closely. There was far too much danger of Unclean detection. He now realized that it might prove to be the only sensible course, especially if they were to steal a small boat. He knew of no other towns to the east; Captain Gimp, on the previous voyage, had mentioned none, though they must exist somewhere along the coast. But he knew nothing at all of the western and southwestern coasts, either. There was a port, known to and used on occasion by the Abbeys, but it lay a thousand leagues to the northwest. He had been warned to avoid it by his superiors when he had set out a year before, for it was full of spies, and only a few of the traders could be really trusted. This was the brawling port of Namcush. A river led down to it from far up near the borders of the territories of the Republic, a river along which trade ran in both directions, though uncertain and often interrupted. In any case, it was of no present use to him, though it might prove a place to steer for in an emergency.

Eventually he slept, but the guard on his mind never relaxed. In the morning he felt there would be much to do.

They had not been on the march for more than a few hours when the road he had been seeking appeared below them. On Hiero’s orders, the group had been traveling through the lowest level of the arboreal highway, though even that was far above the ground. The bog had come to an unheralded end sometime during the day before, and firm ground now lay at the base of the mighty trees.

It was M’reen, taking a turn to scout ahead, who signaled the break in the trees. The others joined her to peer down at what lay below.

The trade route was well trampled and wide, though circuitous, for the tremendous task of felling the forest giants had never been attempted, at least not in these parts. The track simply wound about among their bases, back and forth, but always holding a rough course from east to west. Hiero had never before seen it, since he had left it leagues off to his right on his previous venture south. He knew, however, that it connected after Neeyana through a maze of other paths and roads with distant D’alwah, and that goods passed along it of every sort, ranging from fabrics and furs to dried fruit and spices, and not excluding slaves. It was most probably along the eastern part of this route that his wife had been taken as a slave to Neeyana. At least, from her description, it had sounded like this way.

The trail lay empty and silent under the green shadows of the giant trees, with dappled sunbeams illuminating patches of it here and there. While the others waited patiently, the Metz scanned the immediate surroundings with his mind, using the utmost care. The Unclean would be sure to have a watch on this route, a. main artery of trade to both east and west, and the last thing the little party needed now was to stumble on some outpost or other. He could detect nothing, however, in either direction, and this puzzled him. The distant mass of mental activity which he felt sure was Neeyana had grown increasingly stronger throughout the morning, but why was there nothing nearer? Surely some traders or one of the Unclean patrols ought to be within detection range.

He considered. The mental shields that the Unclean had begun to issue when last he was in the North might account for the silence all about. This seemed implausible, though. He knew the shields were rare and probably very costly in both time and skilled workmanship. He felt sure such shields would be issued to only key personnel—commanders, members of the Unclean Brotherhood, and others in high authority. A simple unit of watchers on the trails would be most unlikely to have one; or, if the captain possessed one, then Hiero ought to be able to pick up the thoughts of the other, humbler members of the group. It was most perplexing.

Keeping his thoughts to the catfolk on the lowest energy level, undetectable save at close range, he issued his orders. They would scout along on either side of the path, moving east and going very slowly and with the utmost care. His allies would signal in their own speech, which was highly unlikely to be sorted out from the myriad forest noises around them, if they found anything worthy of reporting. Meanwhile, he would bring up to the rear and screen everything in a circle with his own mental nets, M’reen would stay close to him on the left side of the trail with B’uorgh, while the other two would take the right. So it was decided and they set out, descending a mighty tangle of lianas and interwoven aerial roots until within a few feet of the earth. Then they dropped and separated.

Their progress was slow, but they covered the ground nonetheless. Every cluster of the widespread roots and great base flanges of the colossal trees had to be scouted and then circled after investigation. Since many of them were enormous in circumference, making the redwoods of the past look like saplings by comparison, this took time. They tried never to lose sight of the trail, while remaining invisible from any eyes that they might somehow have overlooked. Hiero had warned them to be especially wary of any attack from overhead, and he was soon proved right, even though they were not attacked.

A faint yowling call from Ch’uirsh on the far side of the trail brought them up short. Following B’uorgh’s hand signals, the three crept closer, until they were on the edge of the broad path and could see the spotted forms of the two young warriors on the other side. Ch’uirsh and Za’reekh were pointing upward along the route, to something in the fork of a great tree, overgrown with cable-sized vines and even bushes. Straining his eyes, Hiero finally picked out something alien in the mass of tangled foliage, some darker and more structured shape.

They spent five more minutes scouting the neighborhood before climbing cautiously upward. In another minute, they were in the neatly concealed watchtower of the enemy. It was a roofed platform of logs, cleverly bound about with living plants of all kinds and providing a clear view of the path below in both directions—and it was completely empty. That it had not been empty long was obvious. There was a pile of ripe but not yet rotten fruit in one corner; a rude cabinet in another held dried meat and even some hard biscuit. A perfectly good belt of heavy leather, with a brass buckle and studs, had been dropped under a half-full wineskin near the leaf-covered entrance. Smelling the wine, Hiero found it perfectly drinkable.

Over all the place hung a faint, sour odor, and it was one the man had no trouble identifying. Man-rats, he sent, using the lowest energy level of brain waves. The enemy has had a garrison of the foul things they bred here. There was at least one human as well, since they do not drink this stuff in the leather bag. They have been called away suddenly, and I would badly like to know why. He thought hard and came to a decision.

The other four crouched on their haunches, and, very carefully, Hiero sent a probe out in the direction of the Inland Sea. It could not lie more than a few miles to the north of their present position, and he wanted to know what was going on off their flank as they continued. Presently, he found a thing of interest, although exactly what he had found, he was not sure. There was something out there or a number of somethings, maybe, but the whole embodiment of whatever it was lay under a mental blanket, a cover concealing the nature and identity of what was hidden therein. All Hiero could detect was a mass like a huge mental cloud, an inchoate something which he could not pierce. Beyond all shadow of a doubt, the thing was moving; and it was moving, though not fast, in his direction.

He had felt nothing like this in his mind since the year before, when the Unclean ship with the lightning gun mounted forward had caught them all in the drowned city of the northern shore. After a while, he gave up on the area. He could do nothing more, and the mysterious, cloaked patch of energy could not be penetrated. He switched his attention instead, if possible using even more care, to the direction of what he felt sure was Neeyana. This was a real change!

Neeyana was boiling, in the sense of turbulent mental energy. It was as if an ants’ nest had been stirred with a stick, so violent and numerous were the thoughts he detected. His group must be even closer than he had thought, no more than a few miles out of the town boundaries. Now the empty trails and the missing guards made sense. From the various minds that he tapped, Hiero quickly learned that the place was under or about to come under attack! Everyone who could be mustered was being sent to the sea, to man defenses along the waterfront. The threat which had so galvanized the Unclean was coming from the water, and it took little deduction to identify it with the strange mass of sealed-off minds that he had just been searching out. What on earth could all this mean?

He managed to isolate one mind at length, that of a man, a thoroughly nasty man at that, who seemed to be some kind of under-officer of the town garrison. The man was directing a group of underlings who were putting up barricades of logs and sandbags on a street near the water’s edge, and they were working frantically. From the fellow’s brain, the Metz picked up the image of a great fleet, as many as thirty ships, coming from the North. Further, he learned that the Unclean wizards had not been able either to detect or to penetrate in any way the minds of the people on board those ships. This fact had become generally known pretty quickly, and the ordinary soldiers didn’t like it one bit! They were used to having things all their own way, casually killing anyone who disagreed, protected by their Dark Masters’ corrupted science and weapons, both mental and physical. Something had gone wrong, and the Unclean Lords had let the fact that they were taken by surprise become public knowledge a little too fast. Hiero probed further, his excitement growing as he did so.

The man whose skull he was ransacking had not lost all confidence, despite his evident worry. Two of the secret ships were coming. The strange fleet would see what would happen then, when the lightning guns began to speak.

Sitting back and closing his mind to all externals, Hiero made his head stop aching with the effort he had been using and simply tried to reason out what he and the others should be doing next. It was not easy. Yet with all this excitement and the attack corning from those who must somehow be his friends, a better opportunity to escape to the North might never reoccur. If his group could not get to the strange fleet, they might at least be able to steal a decent boat and flee during the confusion of battle. It had to be risked.

Quickly he informed the others of what was taking place ahead of them. We have to get into the town, near the great water somehow, while they are all concentrating on the sea. They must have had a bad scare, because I’m sure that they have pulled out all the landward patrols and guards to reinforce the town defenses. They may have left some small body of troops on this side, but there can’t be many of them. Kill if you have to—quietly. Don’t hurt shes or young; stun them or silence them only.

They now moved off at a much faster pace, with Hiero leading on one side of the trail, while B’uorgh took the point on the other.

As they passed along like shadows, in and out of the tree gloom and through the patches of mottled sunlight, Hiero concentrated on the road immediately ahead. He wanted no encounters with anyone and he was desperately afraid of running into someone or something protected by one of the Unclean mind shields, the lockets of bluish metal he remembered from the past. At his strongest, when he had possessed the power of mental compulsion and even the ability to kill with his mind alone, he had not been able to penetrate one of these mechanisms; he was sure he could not do so now. At the same time, in the back of his mind some half-remembered thing, also from the past, was stirring. He had forgotten something, and it was something he needed right now, this instant. What the devil was it? He shrugged mentally. It would not come, whatever it was, and he would have to wait until it surfaced of its own accord.

They loped along for a mile or so. Then B’uorgh suddenly raised one long, spotted arm and signaled a halt. The catman turned and sped across the trail and took Hiero urgently by the arm, at the same time holding his other hand to a furry ear. They all stopped, and Hiero listened for the sound that the catman’s better hearing had detected. Presently he caught it also, a distant surge and roar, with an occasional higher, more piercing note at intervals. It was the sound of a battle, or he had never heard one. Occasionally there came a heavy crash through the other noises, as if a building or a great tree had fallen. All animal sounds around them seemed hushed now, as if the forest were stilling itself in fright at the unaccustomed uproar in the distance.

Hiero signaled for more speed, and they began this time really to run, though still avoiding the trail’s center. It was a risk, but, Hiero thought, not much of one. All mental activity was enmeshed in the swirl of combat ahead of them, and he could pick up individuals more clearly with every step. The thoughts of frightened women and children were coming through now, as well as those of men who were not fighting and who were baffled by what was happening. The Unclean Masters of Neeyana had stayed pretty well hidden in the past, and the sudden surge of fighting men and Leemutes had come as a shock to a lot of traders and townsfolk who had never known—or preferred not to investigate—who actually ran the whole place. Now these neutrals or noncombatants were panicking, terrified by the fighting and running about trying to get out of the danger zone.

As they drew nearer and nearer, Hiero could pick out with his ears the screams of the unfortunate population whose world had suddenly been overturned. What he could not pick out were any thoughts of the Unclean Masters of Neeyana. He knew the reason was that they were shielded by their mechanisms. Any hope of learning anything from them of what went on was useless. He tried again to reach the attacking forces, whoever they were, but they too remained shrouded by their large, protective shield. He could feel the weight of them out there, but that was all.

Trying to keep watch on his own immediate way was growing wearisome, and he could not scan everything continually without exhausting himself. The physical drain of constant mental search was a very real one.

The roar of battle was now loud in the ears of his group. As the forest drew to an. end in front of them, they began to smell smoke, acrid and greasy. Veils of it were sifting through the last trees, and it grew constantly thicker, cutting off much of the sunlight and making the catfolk choke and sneeze. They were skulking and running through brush now, with Hiero in the lead, his sword in. hand, his spear and shield slung on his back. Killing would be close work, but he hoped to escape without fighting at all. Through the shouts and yells ahead of them came the roaring of fire and another noise, the echo-crashing sounds he had caught earlier. At times these were regular, but at others seemed to be spaced irregularly. Mixed with the burning wood smoke was another unfamiliar smell, sharp and bitter, a reek of something he had never scented before.

Almost before they knew it, they were in the town itself. One moment found them in a sea of low bush, and the next they were in a narrow lane between rows of shabby huts, half-blanketed in the heavy smoke. The smell of filth and ordure was strong enough to contest with the burning wood.

B’uorgh hissed, and they all tensed as several shapes loomed out of the murk ahead. At the same time, a gust of wind, driven down the alley from the sea, revealed the two parties to each other.

Two of the great Man-rats, hung with weapons and carrying sacks filled with either loot or supplies, stood blinking in amazement at the blade of the man and the four scowling masks of the first Children of the Wind they had ever seen—or ever would see. Before the great ears could twitch or the greasy paws even loosen their hold on whatever they carried, they were dead, throats cut and naked-tailed bodies jerking on the grass in death agony. The incredible speed of his allies once again left Hiero gasping. Za’reekh and Ch’uirsh had moved so fast that they were back on guard, daggers ready for a fresh assault, even as the two loathsome were still falling to earth!

Kill anyone armed, Hiero sent. We must get on and try to find a place from which we can see. Look for something tall. There will be no trees, but these folks build tall huts, many times our height. There are too many minds here and too much excitement for me to listen with my own. We must use our eyes and ears instead.

He was trying to remember what Gimp and Brother Aldo had told him long ago about Neeyana. Luchare, too, had been there, on her way to be sold as a slave. What had they told him? It was a very old town, so old that it might even have existed in some form before The Death. The Unclean were everywhere in the town, but usually hidden. And there were some old churches, decayed-looking, with no priests about. These were stone-built and had towers. Such towers would probably have an Unclean garrison, if only for purposes of observation. Still, something had to be tried. Everything was a risk in this smoky maze full of foul odors and the panic of the inhabitants.

Even as he weighed various chances, another of those explosive crashes came from ahead of him. Something heavy fell to the ground, making it shake beneath his feet. Farther off, he heard other booming noises. What could they be? He had to find some place from which he could seel He glanced at the catfolk. They stood silently behind him, then-ears laid back and their neck ruffs bristling. It must, he mused remotely, be terrifying to be brought from the clean forest air into this stench and murk, filled with horrid sounds and unknown dangers. But they were not flinching and were ready to fight. He found the trust heartening, though he wished, not for the first time, that he did not have the responsibility for them on his shoul-

Slowly and carefully, they began to grope their way through the dirty clouds of smoke, testing each comer before they crossed it, straining every sense to locate any possible foe before they themselves were discovered. A particularly heavy wave of black fog engulfed them all, and Hiero signaled, though he was increasingly nervous of using telepathy. Link hands with me and stay close. B’uorgh, you bring up the rear. Kill any not of us.

The flat command made him regretful, but he could take no chances in this foul dark. The enemy had held Neeyana for too long, and their only hope was to remain unseen and unsuspected. He felt his way along a wooden fence of palings, now shutting out the multifarious cries, both in his mind and in his ears, trying only to locate some more substantial structure. He could feel the trembling of the hand, a delicate one, clasping his, and he tried to send strength down his arm to the Speaker-to-be. M’reen had never anticipated all of this, or indeed any of it.

He halted in one moment as his left hand, outstretched, encountered something new. He was touching smooth, greasy stone, worn and slippery in a way that only age can create. He paused and he knew the others down the line were also halting, feeling his excitement and the hesitation.

None of the yells and cries were nearby, though the overall noise was a constant. The hot blanket of fumes and dirty vapor covered him and his friends, but what else might it cover? He tried to guess the hour and decided that it must be around mid-afternoon. How much time did that leave them and what were they to do with it? He shook involuntarily as one of the explosions shattered something he guessed was only a few streets away. The series of reverberations that had more or less gone on continuously while they advanced seemed to be dying off. The next one he heard was much farther off, probably in the direction of the waterfront.

He hand-signaled for a slow advance and, with the smoke stinging his half-opened eyes, felt his way farther along the stonework he had touched a minute back. For perhaps twenty feet, the wall remained unbroken and featureless as high up as he could reach, save for minute gaps in the aged mortar. The large stones held by this cement seemed irregular and not cut or beveled in any way.

A new wave of smoke blew down on them, and he choked and gagged, still creeping along the wall. Then he paused. He was tracing with his hand the edge of a massive doorpost, of heavy and polished wood. He stooped and made sure. It was not a window, but an open door. Blinking in the dirty haze, he listened both with his ears and with his mind.