Alien Chronicles 3 - The Crystal Eye (5 page)

“Gone hunting,” Tantha said before Paket could answer. “Told you already.”

“Yeah, but we still need him,” Elrabin said. He was thinking rapidly, trying to ignore Velia’s frightened panting in his ear as she pressed closer. “I figure we’ll slip into the compound at nightfall—”

“No!” Velia said with a yip. “It’s too dangerous. You’ll be caught.”

Elrabin grinned. “As good as I am? I can break into anything, slip past any security system. I am Elrabin the Quick.”

“You are Elrabin, full of wind,” Tantha muttered. “Why you so brave now?”

Elrabin glared at her a moment, then without a word he ducked into Ampris’s tent. It took a second for his vision to adjust to the shadowy interior. As usual the cubs had scattered their meager possessions carelessly on their side of the tent. Ampris’s side showed only a neatly tied bedroll, a battered portable vid player that needed recharging the next time they ventured near a city, and a small box of personal items. Elrabin glanced around swiftly, then untied her bedroll. From the center he pulled out a pair of hand-links—one of which he tossed to Paket, who was hovering at the entrance—and a side-arm whose safety mechanism was as long gone as its registration number.

Holding the weapon in his hand. Elrabin drew a deep breath and steeled himself, then stepped outside.

He faced Tantha with the side-arm aimed at the ground and waited while she looked at it, her eyes growing wide.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I can be brave now, when the odds are going to be more even. What you want me to be, Spots? Stupid? You want me to charge unarmed into a nest of Viis patrollers and Toth guards and get myself caught too? What good would that do?”

Tantha said nothing. She kept her gaze down as though ashamed.

He stared at her good and hard, then nodded. “Now. Paket and I will go down there and—”

“No,” Velia said. She began to keen. “Don’t risk yourself like this. She isn’t worth it. She isn’t—”

“Quiet,” he said, angry and half-embarrassed.

“I won’t be quiet,” Velia said. Slender, tawny, and young, she was beautiful except when afraid. Now her eyes were wild, and she bared her teeth. “Ampris knew the risks when she went to the field. Why should you risk yourself and Paket for her?”

Elrabin felt something precious turn sideways inside him. He shook his head, not wanting to hear what she was saying. “Stop,” he said with a growl. “It has to be done. You know why.”

“You’ll be caught, both of you. Then the Viis will know there are more of us up here. They’ll come for all of us. How can we run from them? You put all of us in jeopardy.”

He didn’t want to hear what she was saying, but she had a point. Elrabin looked at the weapon in his hand and felt his shoulders sag. What was the best thing to do? Save Ampris? Or protect the group? What would Ampris want him to do?

Doubts and uncertainty crowded him for a moment, clouding his mind. He closed his eyes, longing for the old days when no responsibilities had chained him, when he’d lived by his wits on the streets of Vir.
Yeah,
muttered a sarcastic voice inside his head,
the good old days when you were young and stupid and starving most of the time, taking all the risks for Da while he gambled and sniffed dust.

Growling to himself, Elrabin opened his eyes and faced them all. His grip tightened on the weapon, and he tucked it grimly into his pocket. He was no killer, never had been. But he could do what he had to, if it meant survival for himself or those whom he loved. And he loved Ampris, as a friend, as family, in a way that Velia still could not understand. Ampris would want him to take care of the group and her cubs, but Elrabin knew that Ampris was an excellent leader, the best they could ever have. Without her, the group would suffer.

He met Paket’s gaze. “We’re going after her.”

Approval filled the old Kelth’s eyes, and he nodded at Elrabin, who felt relief at having made the right decision.

But Velia’s eyes grew stormy. “Fool,” she said sharply. “I might as well start mourning now.”

He didn’t want to argue with her in front of the others. Embarrassed, he gestured for her to step aside with him. Taking her inside the shadowy interior of their small shelter, he ducked his head to keep his ears from brushing the roof poles and cradled Velia’s muzzle between his hands.

“Have a little faith in me,” he said softly, his hurt evident in his voice. “I been around a long time, see? I can take care of myself.”

Her hands gripped his, and her breath puffed warm against his palms. “But who will take care of me if I lose you?”

“You ain’t going to lose me,” he said.

She whined softly. “I am afraid for you. You take terrible risks, and I cannot live without you.”

His heart softened and he gave her a gentle lick between her ears. “Ampris would do the same for me.”

“But she has no family, no—”

“She has her sons.”

Velia pulled back her head in scorn. “Those creatures! They are monsters—”

“Hush,” he said, gripping one hand around her muzzle and giving her a tiny shake. “That ain’t Ampris’s fault. And that ain’t got nothing to do with the problem in front of us right now. Time’s getting away. I gotta go.”

She clung to him, holding him tight as she wept against his chest. Sighing, Elrabin circled her with his arms. How he’d hoped that with time, Velia would grow stronger, would find courage. But at every crisis she fell apart. He knew she’d been badly abused before he met her, but at times like this he felt powerless to help her. Ampris kept saying that he should give Velia time. But right now he had to go.

“Here,” he said softly, digging into his capacious pockets. He pulled out a plump grain head and placed it in Velia’s hand.

She stopped weeping and pulled away from him. “Food!” she said in astonishment, her tears forgotten. “But I thought you failed. Why didn’t you tell us at once you had some food? Robuhl has been crying. Twice today I grew dizzy and thought I would faint. Tantha has been half-wild with hunger.”

Elrabin shifted away, uncomfortable. He thought about the numerous basketloads of grain Ampris had concealed behind the shed. They would have feasted beyond their imaginings tonight if all had gone as planned.

Instead, here they were with the scant amount he could stuff into his pockets as he’d run like a coward from the first sign of trouble.

“Never underestimate me, my love,” Elrabin said. He pulled out three more heads, each one of them large and heavy. “If you can stretch ’em right, there should be enough to feed everyone tonight.”

“Oh!” Velia said, cradling them happily in her arms. “I have some chuffie roots that Tantha found this morning, and there are still a few greens. If I use the last of the pepfrike for seasoning, and boil these until they can be mashed, I can—”

To stop his mouth from watering, he slid his muzzle against hers in a final caress and ducked out of the shelter.

Blinking in the light, he saw that Paket had taken the opportunity to fill a water skin and sling it across his crooked shoulders by a leather cord. The old Kelth had armed himself with a rusty slicer that he’d found half-buried in the ground several days ago. He’d been trying to clean the rust off it without much success ever since.

“Ready,” Paket said and held up his slicer with a grin.

Tantha also stood there, holding a water skin and carrying her hunting sling. “Ready,” she echoed. “Let’s go before the Rejects come back with the cubs and there is much trouble.”

Elrabin glared at her impatiently. “Slack yourself, Spots. Ain’t no way we’re taking you.”

“Of course I will go,” Tantha declared.

He sighed, hating the way she always tried to take charge when Ampris was absent. Elrabin felt that Tantha ought to be sitting quietly somewhere, weaving swaddling cloths for her unborn cubs, instead of demanding to be included in the action. But at least she wanted to help, unlike Velia, who had to be bribed and distracted with food.

Looking up at Tantha, Elrabin tried to keep his annoyance out of his voice. “You can’t go,” he said.

Her hand clamped hard on his shoulder, the claws digging in slightly. “I will go. I am strong. You need me with you, not tending a cooking fire.”

Elrabin met her fierce eyes and didn’t back down. “You’re near your time. You can’t run and if we hit any trouble, you won’t be able to fight.”

She bared her teeth and held up her sling. “I can fight! I have good aim with this.”

“And if there’s shooting?” he asked, hoping Velia didn’t overhear this. “A sling and some stones up against stun or worse? No,” he said sharply. “Sorry, Spots, but you’ll just slow us down.”

She growled at him, but he held up his hands, refusing to relent.

“I wish we could take you. We need you, but you ain’t no good for this.”

“I can do what is necessary,” she said fiercely. “I want to kill Viis.”

“Yeah, and what if they kill you?”

She backed her ears in disdain.

“Or what if you start birthing? We gonna all get caught or killed ’cause we got to stop and carry you? What if you lose those cubs? They gonna be all you got left of Morlol. You lose them, and you got nothing. Is that what you want?”

She snapped her teeth together and turned away, but not before he saw the stricken hurt in her eyes. Hunching her shoulders, she strode away without another word.

Silence fell over the camp for a moment. Elrabin stared after Tantha unhappily. He hadn’t wanted to hurt her. But she was so stubborn she had to be hit between the eyes to get her to understand. Still, he felt bad about it.

Velia emerged from their shelter, still holding the grain, and shot him a look of reproach that told him she’d overheard every word. “Oh, Elrabin,” she said softly. “That was harsh.”

“But necessary,” Paket said in his gruff way. “Tantha has no sense sometimes.”

“That doesn’t mean she should be treated cruelly,” Velia said.

“Wasn’t trying to be cruel, see?” Elrabin said. “I just—”

She reached up and gripped his muzzle to silence him. “I know,” she murmured. “But she wants so much to be active. Otherwise she thinks too much about Morlol, and her heart breaks inside.”

He nodded, understanding, wishing these females could understand too. “Better Tantha gets hurt this way instead of with plasma slugs. Now be careful. Light just one cooking fire, and keep it small. They ain’t going to smell that with all the fields blazing. If any shuttles fly this way, everyone hide in the canyon past the stream. Promise me.”

Velia nodded seriously. Her eyes filled with fresh worry, and she began to pant.

He recognized the signs and turned away. “We’re going.”

Collecting Paket with a look, he strode out of camp before Velia could fall apart again. Paket hurried along beside him.

Elrabin glanced at the old one. “Females,” he said with exasperation.

Paket winked at him. “Right,” he said with feeling. “Got their uses though.”

Refusing to laugh, Elrabin snorted, but his annoyance faded. Together they headed along the trail as fast as Paket’s stiff old legs would go.

Halfway down the hill, they veered off the trail and dropped into a shallow canyon. Thereafter, the going was slow, for they had to push their way through the thick undergrowth. Elrabin could hear Paket’s hoarse panting, but the old Kelth never complained and never asked to stop.

It was Elrabin who called a halt at last so the old one could rest. Wheezing for air. Paket sank down on a boulder with wispy golden grass growing at its base, and closed his eyes.

Worried, Elrabin watched him a moment, but didn’t make the old one waste his breath in explaining how he felt. It was obvious anyway that he was in considerable pain.

Guilt touched Elrabin, but he shoved it away and turned his back on Paket to peer ahead down the slope. They were upwind of the fields, so the smoke was blowing in the opposite direction. Still, the stench was enough to choke Elrabin’s nostrils.

He squinted and swiveled back his ears, calculating. It had been maybe two hours since Ampris had been captured. The guards would take her back to the compound’s slave quarters first. There, her missing ownership ring and lack of a registration implant would give her away. Then the Viis owner would probably be consulted. Being a Viis, he would not want to turn her in as he was supposed to according to the law on runaway slaves. He would probably keep her.

But she would be in chains, confined, under orders. She’d been free long enough that the pierced hole in her ear had grown together. They’d have to punch a new one so they could fit an ownership ring through it.

Elrabin snarled silently to himself. He had worn both ring and collar himself. How well he knew the feeling of degradation.

His greatest worry was that Ampris would fall into despair over her capture. She might do something foolish, might risk death, might invite death, might fight until her captors were forced to hurt or kill her.

Think of your cubs, who grow but still need you,
Elrabin thought her way.
Do not lose heart, my old friend.

Behind him Paket lurched to his feet with a groan he tried to conceal. “Wasting time,” he said.

Elrabin looked at Paket and swiveled his ears in fresh worry. Paket looked winded still, despite the rest. Perhaps it would have been wiser to bring Tantha instead.

But as soon as the thought crossed his mind, Elrabin dismissed it. Tantha couldn’t follow orders, and Paket could and would. End of second thoughts.

“We’ll get there,” Elrabin said aloud, to reassure both Paket and himself. “Got to wait until dark anyway.”

Paket limped steadily along. “You think the patrollers will be gone by then?”

Elrabin knew why he was asking. Most of them had possessed the usual registration implant, but Paket had been a worker in the quarries before he was condemned to Vess Vaas. The quarries branded their workers with an ion-release tattoo that couldn’t be eradicated. So Paket was still traceable if he crossed paths with the authorities. Bringing him was a very big risk, except that Elrabin figured the patrollers were already long gone.

“I’ve seen how the patrollers on ag duty operate.” Elrabin answered finally. “Check a field for blight, condemn it, and set the fires. Then they go. Got no reason to hang around. They ain’t here looking for runaways. Their scanners won’t be calibrated for that kind of check.”