Star Born - Andre Norton (life changing books to read .TXT) 📗

large place, and with a quick estimate Dalgard thought that it had been fashioned to harbor close to a hundred inhabitants, at least the nooks suggested that many. But gathered at the foot of the ledge they were descending, spears poised, were perhaps ten males, some hardly past cubhood, others showing the snowy shine of fur which was the badge of age. And behind them, drawn knives in their ready hands, were half again as many merwomen, forming a protecting wall before a crouching group of cubs.

Sssuri spoke to Dalgard. “Spread out your hands⁠—empty⁠—so that they may see them clearly!”

The scout obeyed. In the limited light his ten fingers were fans, and it was then that he understood the reason for such a move. If these mermen had not seen a colonist before, he might resemble Those Others in their eyes. But only his species on all Astra had five fingers, five toes, and that physical evidence might insure his safety now.

“Why do you bring a destroyer among us? Or do you offer him for our punishment, so that we can lay upon him the doom that his kind have earned?”

The question came with arrow force, and Dalgard held out his hands, hoping they would see the difference before one of those spears from below tore through his flesh.

“Look upon the hands of this⁠—my knife brother⁠—look upon his face. He is not of the race of those you hate, but rather one from the south. Have you of the northern reaches not heard of Those-Who-Help, Those-Who-Came-From-the-Stars?”

“We have heard.” But there was no relaxing of tension, not a spear point wavered.

“Look upon his hands,” Sssuri insisted. “Come into his mind, for he speaks with us so. And do they do that?”

Dalgard tried to throw open his mind, awaiting the trial. It came quickly, traces of inimical, alien thought, which changed as they touched his mind, reading there only all the friendliness he and his held for the sea people.

“He is not of them.” The admission was grudging. As if they did not want to believe that. “Why comes one from the south to this place⁠—now?”

There was an inflection to that “now” which was disturbing.

“After the manner of his people he seeks new things so that he may return and report to his Elders. Then he will receive the spear of manhood and be ready for the choosing of mates,” Sssuri translated the reason for Dalgard’s quest into the terms of his own people. “He has been my knife brother since we were cubs together, and so I journey with him. But here in the north we have found evil⁠—”

His flow of thought was submerged by a band of hate so red that its impact upon the mind was almost a blow. Dalgard shook his head. He had known that the merpeople, aroused, were deadly fighters, fearless and crafty, and with a staying power beyond that of any human. But their rage was something he had not met before.

“They come once again⁠—they burn with the fire⁠—They are among our islands⁠—”

A cub whimpered and a merwoman stooped to pat it to silence.

“Here they have killed with the fire⁠—”

They did not elaborate upon that statement, and Dalgard had no wish for them to do so. He was still very glad that it had been dark when he had climbed to the top of that cliff, that he had not been able to see what his imagination told him lay there.

“Do they stay?” That was Sssuri.

“Not so. In their sky traveler they go to the land where lies the dark city. There they make much evil against the day when this shall be their land once more.”

“But these lie if they think that.” Another strong thought broke across the current of communication. “We are not now penned for their pleasure. We may flee into the sea once more, and there live as did our fathers’ fathers, and they dare not follow us there⁠—”

“Who knows?” It was Sssuri who raised that objection. “With their ancient knowledge once more theirs, even the depths of the sea may not be ours much longer. Do they not know how to ride upon the air?”

The knot of mer-warriors stirred. Several spears thudded butt down into the sand. And Sssuri accepted that as an invitation to descend, summoning Dalgard after him with a beckoning finger.

Later they sat in a circle in the cushioning gray powder, the two from the south eating dried fish and sea kelp, while Sssuri related, between mouthfuls, their recent adventures.

“Three times have they flown across these islands on their way to that city,” the Elder of the pitifully decimated merman tribe told the explorers.

“But this time,” broke in one of his companions, “they had with them a new ship⁠—”

“A new ship?” Sssuri pounced upon that scrap of information.

“Yes. The ships of the air in which they travel are fashioned so”⁠—with his knife point he drew a circle in the sand⁠—“but this one was smaller and more in the likeness of a spear with a heavy point⁠—thus”⁠—he made a second sketch beside the first, and Dalgard and Sssuri leaned over to study it.

“That is unlike any of their ships that I have heard of,” Sssuri agreed. “Even in the old tales of the Days Before the Burning there is nothing spoken of like that.”

“It is true. Therefore we wait now for the coming of our scouts, who were set in hiding upon their sea rock of resting, that they may tell us more concerning this new ship. They should be here within this time of sleeping. Now, go you to rest, which you plainly have need of, and we shall call you when they come.”

Dalgard was willing enough to stretch out in the sand in the shadows of the far end of the cave. Beyond him three cubs slumbered together, their arms about each other, and a feeling of peace was there such as he had not known since he left the stronghold of Homeport.

The weird glow of