Alien Chronicles 3 - The Crystal Eye (16 page)

For a moment, she stood gazing at the forests, the breeze ruffling the fur of her muzzle, her nostrils filled with old scents and memories of long ago. Sahmrahd Kaa. that resplendent, bronze-skinned sovereign, had hunted the forests of his imperial lands with great pleasure, coming back to the lodge on soft evenings such as this with his blue eyes gleaming and his jeweled collar brilliant with the reflected fires of sunset. Splattered with mire, his fine clothing smelling of narpine sap, Viis sourness, and blood, he would stride inside the lodge ahead of a noisy retinue of hunters, casting aside gloves and weapons before spreading wide his arms for little Israi, who always ran to him in greeting while Ampris tagged behind, watching and envying her mistress such a magnificent father.

“Ampris.”

The voice recalled her from the past, with all its pleasures and deep pain. Ampris slammed the door on her memories and turned to find herself staring into the sympathetic eyes of Luax.

“We camp here tonight,” the female Reject said. Her pink and green skin was dusty. Her eyes looked tired and worried. “Is not close enough to water, but folk too tired to walk more. When eat, will be time for council.”

Ampris stared at Luax through the twilight shadows, her breath tangled in her throat. Again she had to control an onslaught of fear and worry, had to remain calm, had to cling to the hope that she could successfully defend her son’s innocence.

“You hear?” Luax asked her when she said nothing. “We have the council after we eat.”

“Yes,” Ampris forced herself to say. She clutched her Eye of Clarity for comfort, wishing she could tap into the font of wisdom legend said it contained. “Thank you, Luax.”

The Reject flicked out her tongue. “Not time for thanking yet,” she said in grim warning, and left Ampris alone.

CHAPTER
•SIX

Nashmarl stood among the trees in the darkness, his face mutinous in the light of the tiny fire Ampris had kindled. “I won’t do it,” he said.

She glared at him with a mixture of exasperation and alarm. “You must. It is the law—”

“Law!” he shouted. “We don’t have laws. We’re savages, living in the wilderness. We can do anything—”

In two swift steps, Ampris was on him. She snapped her teeth right in his face, wishing he had visible ears so that she could nip one. Instead, she gripped him by his neck and shook him the way she had when he was younger. “Shut up!” she growled at him. “Don’t say that. They will hear you, and believe you really did kill Steegin.”

His green eyes flared wide. “But I
didn’t!”

Foloth laughed. He was sitting by the fire, tending it with small twigs that he fed into the flames one at a time. The firelight danced orange across his flattened features, making him look impish. “You are so stupid, my little brother. Mother, aren’t Aaroun females supposed to have visions when they give birth, visions that tell the future of their sons and daughters? Why didn’t you look into Nashmarl’s eyes and see that he was doomed to be a fool? You could have snapped his neck and saved us all this trouble today.”

Old grief and rage engulfed her. With a roar, she released Nashmarl and turned on Foloth with a savagery that wiped the smirk off his face and made him shoot to his feet.

“Silence!” she shouted at him, wanting to shake him, to claw him to ribbons. Trembling with rage, she came at him with her teeth bared, and Foloth scrambled back, nearly tripping over the fire.

“Mother, don’t!” he said in fright. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that.”

Another growl rumbled through her throat. Her ears were plastered against her skull, and she gave him the flat, merciless glare she had used when she was a professional killer. “Never say that again,” she said. Her voice was hoarse and unsteady. She pointed at him with her claws extended. “Do you hear me? Never say anything like that again.”

“I was just joking,” Foloth replied sullenly. He glanced at Nashmarl, then back at her. “Trying to lighten the situation.”

Her rage flared higher. “A joke?” she repeated, unable to believe what he’d said. “Do you think I am a fool, Foloth? I am your mother. I am not worthy of your disrespect.”

“It’s Nashmarl I don’t respect,” Foloth said. “Not you, Mother.”

She looked into his dark eyes and saw only deceit and self-interest there. Her grief over all that had recently occurred welled up again, intensified by her profound disappointment in both her sons tonight. Her throat filled with emotion, and she found herself unable to speak.

“Goldie?” Elrabin’s voice called softly from behind her. The Kelth came up to their small, private campsite, looking serious indeed. He was moving more slowly than usual, and he looked gaunt and tired. “It be time.”

She couldn’t cope with it, not just then. Nashmarl wasn’t prepared. He wouldn’t listen to her. He wouldn’t even try to save himself. Foloth was being so . . . so impossible and cruel. The past flooded her with unwanted memories, of a day so dark she’d hoped to close it from her heart forever.

“Goldie, you hear me?” Elrabin said more loudly. “Council is sitting. Got to take Nashmarl and—”

“I won’t go,” Nashmarl said in a defiant whine. “They all hate me. They won’t listen to anything I say. Mother should go and speak for me.”

“Your ma can’t speak for you, cub,” Elrabin said curtly. “For once, you got to face up to what you did.”

“They’ve already judged me,” Nashmarl said. “They threw stones at me.”

“Ain’t the only thing that should be done to your young hide,” Elrabin muttered.

Ampris bowed her head. She was shaking all over. Worry consumed her. Where had she gone wrong in raising her sons? She had loved them with all her heart from the first inhalation of their newborn scent. She had given them all she could, loving them doubly because of their poor sister. She thought of her one daughter, so tiny and new, with her flat little face and wobbly, misshapen head. Only a short span of life, only a few hours to hold and caress that little one before she was gone forever. A piece of Ampris’s heart had died with her daughter that day, leaving a small empty void that never healed. She closed her eyes, listening to her sons argue and bicker, and wished the rest of her could be as numb.

“Goldie,” Elrabin said quietly, coming up behind her. His hand touched her shoulder, and she started. “You okay?”

Tears streamed down her muzzle. She put her hands to her eyes, unable to answer.

“Hey,” he said in concern, coming around to face her. “You can’t defend the cub like this. You got to be more hopeful.”

She lifted her drenched eyes to Elrabin’s, unable to take his comfort. “I can’t lose another cub,” she said. “I can’t!”

He opened his mouth, but she could bear no more. She darted around him and started for the trees, but Elrabin grabbed the coarse cloth of her jerkin and pulled her back.

“You ain’t running off now,” he said. “Ain’t the time. Nashmarl needs your help.”

“What other cub?” Foloth asked sharply. “What does she mean?”

Ampris stared at the ground, knowing Elrabin was right, but unable right then to pull herself together.

“You can’t fall apart on us,” Elrabin said. “We need you, Goldie. Not just the cubs, but the whole camp.”

“I let them down,” Ampris said. “I let everyone down, especially Paket.”

Elrabin’s tall ears swiveled back and he wrinkled his lip. “Nah. You ain’t believing that. Paket knew what he was getting into. You think he didn’t have the choice of staying behind? Lose the pity, Goldie. Ain’t no room in this life for it. You got other things to do.”

It was the kind of pep talk he used to give her after a brutal day in the arena. Ampris soaked up his encouragement now, knowing that part of her tears came from fatigue. She nodded, wiping her face.

“Here.” Elrabin lifted her hand and closed her fingers around her Eye of Clarity. “You hold on to that a minute and find yourself. I got to shake sense into a couple of cubs.”

Ampris nodded again, clutching her pendant. Already she was calmer, although whether it was from Elrabin’s good sense, or some quality in the stone she held, or simply that her emotions were now spent, she couldn’t say.

He turned away from her and glared at the cubs. Nashmarl stood wide-eyed and silent. But Foloth had his head tilted to one side, and he was staring intently at Ampris.

“What other cub?” he asked again. “What did she mean by that? Aren’t we her only—”

“No, you ain’t,” Elrabin said gruffly.

Ampris lifted her head. “No,” she said. “Elrabin, don’t.”

He looked at her over his shoulder. “Ain’t no good keeping secrets.”

“What secrets?” Foloth asked eagerly.

Ampris backed her ears. “It is not a secret. Elrabin, I don’t wish it discussed.”

“You just working up their curiosity now,” he said and glanced at Foloth. “You had a sister. She died at—”

“Elrabin!” Ampris cried.

“—birth,” he said and looked at her defiantly.

The band of alarm constricting her heart released its grip, and Ampris found she could breathe again.

Both cubs looked at her blankly. “That’s it?” Nashmarl asked finally.

“Why keep that a secret?” Foloth asked.

Ampris turned away from them. She could not explain further. She wanted them to never know about the horrors of Vess Vaas Laboratory or the cruel scientist Ehssk who had taken her daughter away for dissection. Neither cub seemed to have vivid memories of their early days in the lab, and she wanted it to stay that way. For their sakes. They had enough to bear already.

“Oh,” Foloth said after a moment of silence. “My joke was bad. wasn’t it? That’s why you lost your temper with me.”

She sighed and made herself face him. “Yes, my darling. It was in very bad taste. But you didn’t know. You—”

“Ain’t the time for jokes, whether old times be known or not,” Elrabin broke in. “Goldie, you got to take Nashmarl before the council now, or they’ll be voting without you.”

She blinked, remembering the crisis at hand, and reached out to Nashmarl.

He glared at her, looking both defiant and scared. “I won’t go! You go for me.”

“I can’t,” she told him.

“You mean you won’t.”

“No,” Elrabin said to him impatiently. “She can’t. You be the one in trouble, cub. You be the one who’s got to stand before the council.”

“The council is stupid!” Nashmarl cried. “You’re all stupid! I didn’t push Steegin. Why won’t anyone take my word for it?”

“Maybe they will, if you show up to explain your side, see?” Elrabin said.

“Nashmarl, we are trying to help you,” Ampris said, her worry rising up afresh. “Why won’t you cooperate?”

“Maybe he’s really guilty,” Foloth said.

Ampris glared at him. “That’s enough from you!”

Elrabin also turned to face Foloth. “You know something? See something? Or you just making this up?”

Foloth did not immediately reply, and Ampris felt herself turning cold. Nashmarl came to her side, staring at his brother as though he could not believe it.

“Foloth,” he said hoarsely, “what are you doing?”

Foloth’s dark eyes held nothing at all, then a slow smirk spread across his mouth.

Ampris let out her breath, and at that moment could have watched him being skinned alive.

Nashmarl clenched his fists and ran at his brother, but Elrabin stepped between them, holding them apart.

“That’s not funny, Foloth!” Nashmarl shouted, swinging ineptly and almost hitting Elrabin instead.

“Stop it! Both of you!” Ampris grabbed Nashmarl and pulled him back before he hurt Elrabin, who was far from well. “I am ashamed of you both,” she said, shaking Nashmarl until he wrenched away from her. She glared at him and Foloth.

“You’d better be nice to me. my brother,” Foloth said, still taunting Nashmarl. “Or I might decide to be a bad witness.”

“You weren’t there! You didn’t see what happened.”

“Enough!” Ampris said sharply, silencing them. She was so exasperated words almost failed her. Nothing she did or said seemed to get through their thick skulls. “Foloth, you will stay here. Put out the fire and go to bed. That is an order, not a request.”

“But I’ll miss the decision,” Foloth said. He shot Nashmarl another icy glare of contempt. “You mean I have to wait until morning to know if I’m to be shunned because of my stupid brother?”

Growling, Nashmarl started for him again. Ampris pulled Nashmarl back and gave him a quick nip on his nape. He hissed, and she spun him around and put her finger in his face.

With her teeth bared, she said, “I will give you no more warnings. Behave,
now.”

Nashmarl was breathing hard. His face had turned pink, and his green eyes seethed with resentment and fear. “You always take his side,” he muttered.

“When you stop rising to the bait, he will stop tormenting you,” she said. “Now be quiet.”

With Nashmarl glaring at the ground in momentary silence, Ampris turned on Foloth. He deserved punishment. but she was out of time. “Not one more word from you,” she said to Foloth.

He smiled a tiny, satisfied little smirk, gone as fast as quicksilver. “I’ve said all I need to.”

Ampris pointed at the fire. “Do your chores and go to bed. When this is over, if you say anything to torment or tease Nashmarl, I will flog you with a stick. Is that clear?”

He looked at her with a blink, unsure.

She never let her gaze waver. “I can, and I will. There is a first time for everything, and if you think you are too big for punishment, remember that I am bigger.”

Foloth said nothing, but she knew he believed her threat. That was sufficient for now.

“Goldie,” Elrabin said into the quiet, “you be late.”

“I know.” She sighed and gripped Nashmarl’s arm. “Let’s go see if we can straighten out this mess.”

As they walked through the trees toward the large fire where the other members of the camp sat waiting, Ampris pulled Nashmarl closer to her and murmured into his ear, “You must realize there is more at stake than our being shunned.”

“Sure,” Nashmarl said in a sullen voice. “Having to put up with Foloth’s—”

“No!”
She pinched his arm to make him listen. “If it is ruled deliberate murder, Nashmarl, your neck will be broken.” She paused long enough to hear Nashmarl’s startled intake of breath. “Or we can choose the shunning, to be cut off forever from any contact with free abiru. I did not want your brother to hear this.”