Secret of the Stars (8 page)
Read Secret of the Stars Online
Authors: Andre Norton
Dim, very dim, pictures of a big ship. Of a woman who crooned to herself, or spoke to him, urging always that they must take care, that they were in danger, that men in uniform personified that danger.
Men in uniform! What uniform? The police? He had never shrunk from them, just known the wariness of the lawless against the law. Spacemen? He had faced hundreds of them across his table with only a general interest in the yarns they could spin, and a slight contempt for their inept playing of a highly skilled game of chance.
There was the officer in gray, the one who had questioned him at the E-station. Perhaps that sniff of ver-talk had heightened his powers of recall, sparked some hidden memory. Yes, it was a gray tunic he hated. He must fear gray tunics, but why?
If he could only force past that mental curtain the long-ago conditioning had left in his mind! Rysdyke must know something. What was so odd about his name? And who were the Ffallian? Who spoke that language which had dripped so liquidly from the spaceman’s tongue?
True, most of the men he knew had two names. But on the streets nicknames were accepted; admittedly, Joktar was unlike any other he had ever heard. Joktar . . . Ffallian . . . his thoughts began to spin fantastic patterns as he drifted into sleep.
Rysdyke did not return to the hut for the next two days where Joktar, his disappointment and frustration growing, waited to pin him down for an explanation. His nurse, caring for him brusquely but with some experience, was a taciturn man who commented now and then on the state of the weather and carried with him a none-too-pleasant aroma of half-cured skins. He only became animated when Joktar chanced to mention the cat-bear, and then he would favor his patient with a lecture on the habits and natures of various animals to be found in the Fenrian wilderness, pouring forth a flood of facts the Terran found to be interesting after all.
And the more he heard from Roose, the more Joktar began to realize that his own trek across this territory was in the nature of a fabulous exploit. For someone green to Fenris to survive both blanket storm and an attack from a zazaar was astonishing to Roose.
“You did as good as a regular woods-runner, boy,” he commented. “You’d be able to run a prime trap line. Wait ’til you get that burn of yours scarred over good and you ‘n’ me’ll head out into the breaks and get us some real hunting.”
“But I thought you people were in the business of raiding company holes,” Joktar hoped to draw out more information.
“Sure, we do that. But we run fur traps, too. Can’t get all the grub and supplies we need raiding. ’Bout a dozen of the fellas have lines out and have regular hunting sections up back . . .” He jerked a thumb toward the forepart of the hut. “The chief, he was a trader, he knows how to sell our stuff to smugglers.”
“Thank you for the recommendation, Roose.”
Joktar recognized the voice, though he had not seen before the face of the man who now entered the hut. This was the raider who had led the attack on the mine hole wearing the livery of the company.
He was as tall as Roose, having the advantage of Rysdyke by several inches. But unlike the ursine trapper, this man was slender and moved lithely. Now he squatted down by the Terran’s pallet.
“So you plan to hit the hills with Roose?”
“Ah, chief, the kid’s good! He’d have to be, or he couldn’t get him a zazaar and last out a blanket.”
The other nodded. “Exactly, Roose. In fact he’s so good he bothers me. But there are a lot of surprises in the universe, and by this time we should be used to bombs out of a blue, yellow, or pink sky. Kauto fflywryl orta . . .”
Again the words meant nothing, yet pried at Joktar’s memory.
“I don’t understand . . .”
The other sighed. “No, you don’t. Which is a pity. But maybe time’ll solve that problem. You were handy with that snowball back at the hole. I gather you have a dislike for the companies.”
“Wouldn’t you, under the circumstances?”
“Maybe. But you could have warned them and been given free status.”
“Would I?” Joktar returned dryly.
He answered with a smile. “No, probably not. You’ve guessed rightly just how far their gratitude would reach.”
“I know the streets.”
“And you’re lucky. About one man in a thousand ever escapes, and out of that number, one in five hundred lasts out his first week of freedom.”
“You get your recruits the hard way.”
“We have exactly two escaped emigrants in this mob. The rest of us are free trappers and a few who do not explain their past occupations.”
“But you all hate the companies.”
“Not the companies,” the other corrected him. “Fenris would be a deserted hell hole without the mines. But we are at war with their methods and their deliberate hogging of this planet. The alibite mines occupy a few pimples on this continent, the companies exploit them and that’s that. They will do nothing to build up trade or import any goods save the supplies they themselves need. They won’t sell passage on their ships to free men, but they bring in their bonded employees and emigrants they can control utterly. The freeze-out is on and has been for two years. Not a single free trader can get field clearance at Siwaki. No ship save a company one or a patrol cruiser can set down here. They think they have Fenris sewn up tight and they want to keep it that way.
“If free man can establish independent holdings on this world the companies can’t hold their emigrant gangs without triple the number of guards they now employ or other expensive safety devices. Now the country itself is a barrier against escape, with settlements it wouldn’t be.
“They want alibite only. We want other things. Sure, this climate is grim, almost six months of winter, or what seems winter to Terrans. But second-generation settlers from Kanbod, or Nord, or Aesir could live well here. Men can adapt, you’re an example.”
Of what?
Joktar wanted to ask when the chief was hailed from outside the hut.
(Closed com between Kronfeld and Morle)
M: Scouts aren’t on to our man. The one who took the disc really thought subject had helped mug his partner. He’s shipped out since. Serves in the Third Sector, no contact with critical Fifth in the past. Doesn’t know Lennox as far as I can learn. So that angle can be washed out.
K: It’s pleasant to be able to eliminate
one
small factor anyway. Did your man get to Kern?
M: We’re trying. Kern’s a vip on the streets. Even the port authorities are touchy about pushing him.
K: Why was he raided then?
M: Funny thing about that. The word around is that Kern arranged that bit of action himself, to get rid of some underlings he didn’t trust. And the E-men exceeded their instructions, making a clean sweep. I know he never intended
our
man to be held and he unpocketed for ten others who were pulled in. Hudd did discover that Kern took in the woman and child. Woman died soon after. She was ill when she arrived. He can now establish that the child was our subject. What about the Fenris angle, any word from there?
K: One of Thom’s agents tried to bid him in at the auction, but didn’t make it; couldn’t press that without blowing his cover. He’ll pass the word in the outlands. There’s a brawl cooking up there and maybe we can spring them during the trouble. But if our information is correct, this lad can take worse than Fenris and still come up fighting. We have to have him. I’d cheerfully fry those service fanatics if I could get these two hands on them and had a hot enough fire handy.
(Report to home office, Harband Mining Company, Project 65, Fenris)
Prospect Hole, Blue Mountain district destroyed by local outlaw group. Request permission to go all out against these woods-runners. May we appeal to the patrol for assistance?
(Reply from home office)
Do nothing. Committee on way to investigate situation. Ramifications reach beyond Fenris. Must be no trouble. Repeat, no trouble while Councilor Cullan is on Loki.
7
“Samms is going to move. Since he’s had the blast out with Raymark and made himself top man in the Kortoski mob, everything’s been quiet. Now he wants a general council.”
Joktar stood within the slightly open hut door. The major portion of the men housed on the mound-fort were gathered outside listening to a report from a man dressed in full trail kit.
“His runner’s going through the Five Peak district. They want us and Ebers’ crowd. Samms aims to make it a bit parley. Swears he has a major chance for all of us now—”
Rysdyke interrupted. “This could be the break we’ve been waiting for, Hogan. Raymark was no good to deal with; he wanted our sections kept separate so we wouldn’t have to share any good loot. Samms may be a different sort.”
“Samms and Ebers,” the chief repeated thoughtfully. “Well, a meet won’t do any harm. We can listen to what they have to offer but we don’t have to commit ourselves. That is, if this is on a straight orbit. Suppose we say we’ll meet them at the River Island,” he glanced at the sky, “and, since the signs look promising for a quiet weather spell, make that three days from now. You can tell that to this runner, Marco. Then you take two of the boys with vorps and full supplies. I just want to make sure that no one is planning an incident.”
Several of the listening men grinned wolfishly. Joktar gathered that one’s trust in one’s fellow men did not spread any further on Fenris than it had in the streets. The company broke apart and only Rysdyke and the chief remained before Joktar’s hut.
“What do you make of this?” the ex-spaceman wanted to know.
The other’s answer was cryptic. “Perks supported Samms just before he called Raymark out.”
“Perks? But he turned yellow-belly, sold out to the companies. He doesn’t dare leave the Harband compound; he’d be shot on sight after what happened to his squad in that ambush. Oh, do you think Samms might be following the same flight pattern? That why you sent the vorps ahead?”
“Might be.” There was a lazy, teasing note in that answer. “Joktar!” He had not turned his head, but he spoke the eavesdropper’s name with certainty. The quasi-prisoner opened the makeshift door of the hut.
“Here’s the problem, boy,” Hogan continued. “You should know it’s like from the streets. The Kortoski mob—they range north of here—had Raymark for their boss. He wasn’t too bright when it came to planning capers, but he was a good fighter and had what it took to keep his boys in hand, an old time trapper. Then his mob picked up an escapee last year. He’d had luck about as spectacular as yours. Seems Samms is a third-generation Martian colonist and so adapts better to this god-forsaken climate.
“Samms began to pick up a following of his own inside the mob, among them one very bright boy, Perks. Perks had furnished a lot of the brains behind Raymark before then. He can plan but he’s no leader; most of the mob hate his guts. Then, about four months ago, Perks apparently got fed up. He and a squad he was leading were captured in a quite obvious trap. And since then Perks has fared well at company hands.”
“Sold out his own men!” Rysdyke exploded.
“So it appears. Then, a very short time ago, Samms called Raymark to a blast out. Raymark was erased, and Samms is top man. Now,” Hogan glanced at Joktar for the first time, “give me
your
unvarnished appraisal of the situation.”
“I’d say Samms was planted.”
“Where, by whom, for what?” Hogan inquired in that lazy voice.
“On the surface by the companies, maybe to do just what he did, climb to the top in some mob then to take it out of running, or use it to cut down some of the other independents.”
“And Perks?”
“Was his runner.”
“But you said ‘on the surface.’ What could lie under that surface?”
“That Samms is straight and the Perks situation is in reverse. Perks has been planted on the company by Samms. When he’s rooted there solid, Samms moves to take over the mob. Maybe Perks got news to him to spark that jump.”
Hogan laughed. Rysdyke’s scowl faded as he chewed on that.
“So speaks a man who knows the streets. That the way a vip such as Kern would move?”
Joktar shrugged, bit his lip as that gesture pulled his sore shoulder.
“With variations. Both are pretty simple set-ups for a man like Kern.” He gave credit where it was due.
Kern, the intriguer, had been fascinating to watch in operation, and Kern’s plans had always worked with the precision of well-tended machinery.
“Then this hot news Samms wants to share with us—” Rysdyke began.
“Could conceivably be the real goods. So we’ll attend Samms’ council with our own precautions laid down in advance. My young friend,” he spoke again directly to Joktar, “the criminal mind is sometimes a distinct asset. I think you should meet Samms, your private estimation of him and his proposal may be enlightening. Suppose you set yourself to the business of getting on your feet in time to accompany us.”
The party which left on the third day was a small, select one. As yet Joktar knew only a small portion of the mob. Most of them had been trappers, individuals who had pioneered in the Fenrian backlands before the companies took over. One or two had been prospectors frozen out by the monopolies. The two major exceptions were Rysdyke, a cashiered spaceman, and the chief, Hogan, who had once been a trader in Siwaki, losing his business when the companies closed the port to free ships.
Now Hogan, Rysdyke, Roose, and another trapper named Tolkus, with Joktar in tow, left for the council. But the Terran believed that others had gone before them more secretly.
The day was a fine one with no wind and Joktar stripped off his face mask, having learned that he could do as well without that added covering. Their trail wove into the grove and the Terran tried to picture this country as it was when the big thaw was in progress. Fenris must be a totally different world then. Another track joined the trail they followed. Roose pointed to it.
“Lamby bull, and big!”
“How long ago?” The trapper dropped to one knee, inspected the indentations in the snow with his nose only a few inches above the markings.
“Maybe an hour, could be less.”
“The boys went along here two hours ago, and they’d keep an eye on their back trail,” Rysdyke offered.
But Roose was troubled. “Bull following a man trail, that way means he has a real mad on. Might even have been creased by some soft head who didn’t hunt him down for the real kill. Those cracked guards along the road take shots at everything moving, and a lamby can travel pretty far with a crease to stir him up. A wounded bull is a hard risk any way you look at it.”
“Well, you know the drill, Roose. We’ll make this your party. And, Tolkus, start weaving. This is no time for any of us to get mixed up with a lamby that wants to chew up a human.”
Roose quickened pace, keeping to the trail, while Tolkus wove a new path first to the right, and then to the left, investigating all thick strands of brush or clumps of trees.
“Why did they ever name those devils ‘lambys’ in the first place?” Rysdyke wondered.
“Someone with an infernal sense of humor pulled that,” Hogan remarked. “Anything
less
like a lamb would be hard to find. Only maybe it’s the texture of the fur which gave them that designation.”
“Just a tourist guide at heart, aren’t you?” Rysdyke laughed. “Not that we ever have any tourists to guide, though I’d like to introduce some of the company vips to a lamby. Those bulls are always mean. You get one really mad and he’s going to wipe the earth with you or the nearest thing which looks, smells, and moves like you. A lamby will trail a man for miles, hide in the bush along a path, and spike his horns into the first traveler who passes. And since he makes about as much noise as a feather floating in air, he usually wins the first round. Then, if the traveler has had any companions, the lamby will get his in return.”
“But does that satisfy the first victim?” asked Joktar. “Lots of little surprises on this world, aren’t there?” He remembered his own sudden entanglement with the zazaar.
“Quite true,” Hogan agreed. “So try always to make your first attack the last and in your own favor. Yes, this is not what you might term a pleasant world for a restful vacation.”
“But it could be a halfway decent one for men to live on,” the ex-spaceman defended the wasteland.
“To what other end do we labor?” The lazy note was back in Hogan’s voice. “Break the companies’ hold, free Fenris, then comes the millennium.”
Rysdyke laughed half-angrily. “Don’t you believe in anything?”
“Oh, the power of words is well known. And maybe we can badger the companies into recognizing a few rights besides those they sit upon for themselves. But Fenris will never be a garden spot, and men are never going to quit grabbing all they can reach with their grubby fingers. Sweep away the companies here and the vacuum left will be speedily filled. We’ll then have master trappers, big traders crowding in, eating up the smaller men, building a kingdom in their turn. And some day the last lamby will be skinned, the last zazaar tracked and denuded of its pelt. Then new deposits of alibite, or something similar will be located, the companies will come back.” He rubbed the back of his hand across his mask. “History will repeat itself. That is what is so fatiguing about history, it’s so repetitious. Personalities change, the pattern never. Nothing but the same boring mistakes, rises and falls, catastrophes and achievements, balancing each other without end. If man were offered something else—” Hogan’s eyes lifted from the trail, to the sky behind the ragged mountain peaks, “he probably wouldn’t dare to take it. No, we’ll go on and on in our own twisted way until we’re finished like the others before us.”
“Those who built your mound-fort?” asked Joktar.
“Yes. Doubtless that was thrown together by some company who had the blah-blah concession here and was determined to hold it against a band of miserable, dirty outlaws. This is a wolf-head planet now, and it always has been. The very climate pulls men into its pattern. Whoever did grub up that artificial mountain must have had a major enemy breathing down their necks. The situation must have been the same: greed, defense of one’s treasure, probably eventual loss to other and stronger attackers. Ah—”
A crack of sound, carrying sharply through the air, put the three into action before its echoes had died away. Joktar, favoring his tender shoulder, shoved sideways, squatting behind the best protection he could find, a tree bole surrounded by a draggle of underbrush. And Rysdyke and Hogan disappeared so skillfully and completely that they might have been permanently removed from the landscape by one of the primitive atomic explosions of Terra’s past.
Joktar had not been provided with a blaster and he was wondering how he was expected to defend himself. There was a wisp of smoke curling into the air from a heat-shriveled twig. That bit of branch had caught the outer edge of a blaster beam, and it hung only a pace or so beyond where they would have been in another short moment. Since none of them in the least resembled a lamby bull, there was reason to think they had been selected for elimination. Joktar froze, no use provoking another shot from that hidden marksman.
Was someone in Hogan’s own organization getting ambitious, wanting to move up as Samms had done, but not willing to risk the face down of a call out where his chief would have an equal chance? Joktar frowned. This was quite like the streets, treachery against treachery, the most cunning player to sweep the board.
Were Hogan and Rysdyke pinned down now as he was, or using their superior knowledge of woodcraft to scout around behind the man in ambush? He would swear there was nothing moving about.
Snow creaked. Joktar turned his head with infinite stealth, feeling that perhaps the lurking menace might be able to catch the whisper of his hood furs as he moved. But what he saw was not a man.
Matted fur? Hair? Wool? Blue-gray in color, so close in shade to the branches which framed it that the actual outlines were blurred. Sprouting from that mat of hair were two sharp, upward-pointing horns, a third centering a broad toad’s snout. And all three of those horns were sticky with red clots, clots which had dribbled down to the fur. A drip of mucous from the nose flaps was also discolored with that tell-tale scarlet. This thing had gored to kill and recently.