Hunt the Space-Witch! (20 page)

“Listen,” he said.

“A storm,” said La Floquet. “Outside the confines of our barrier. The same happened yesterday at this time. It storms … but not in here. We live in an enchanted Valley where the sun always shines and life is gentle.” A bitter grimace twisted his thin, bloodless lips. “Gentle!”

“Get used to it,” Thornhill said. “We may be here a long time.”

His watch read 16:42 when they finally went up the hill to get the Aldebaranian. In the two hours he had seen a shift in the configuration of the suns—the red had receded, the blue grown more intense—but it was obvious that there would be no night, that light would enter the Valley around the clock. In time he would grow used to that. He was adaptable.

Nine people, plucked from as many different worlds and cast within the space of twenty-four hours into this timeless valley beyond the storms, where there was no darkness. Of the nine, six were human, three were alien. Of the six, four were men, two were women.

Thornhill wondered about his companions. He knew so little about them yet. Vellers, the strong man, was from Earth; Thornhill knew nothing more of him. McKay and the mousy woman were ciphers. Thornhill cared little about them. Neither the Regulan nor the Spican had uttered a word yet—if they could speak the Terran tongues at all. As for Marga, she was an astronomer and was lovely, but he knew nothing else. La Floquet was an interesting one—a little dynamo, shrewd and energetic but close-mouthed about his own past.

There they were. Nine pastless people. The present was as much of a mystery to them as the future.

By the time they reached the mountain ledge, Thornhill and La Floquet and the girl, the Aldebaranian had seen them and was glaring coldly at them. The storm had subsided in the land outside the Valley, and once again white clouds drifted in over the barrier.

Like all his race the Aldebaranian, a man of medium height and amiable appearance, was well fleshed, with pouches of fat swelling beneath his chin and under his ears. He was gray of skin and dark of eye, with gleaming little hooked incisors that glinted terrifyingly when he smiled. He had extra joints in his limbs as well.

“At last some others join me,” the alien remarked in flawless Terran Standard as they approached. “I knew life could hardly go on here as it had.”

“You're mistaken,” La Floquet said. “It's a delusion common to new arrivals. You haven't lived here all your life, you know. Not really.”

The Aldebaranian smiled. “This surprises me. But explain, if you will.”

La Floquet explained. In a frighteningly short space of time the alien had grasped the essential nature of the Valley and his position in it. Thornhill watched coldly; the speed with which the Aldebaranian cast off delusion and accepted reality was disturbing.

They returned to the group at the river's edge. By now Thornhill was beginning to feel hungry; he had been in the Valley more than four hours. “What do we do about food?” he asked.

La Floquet said, “It falls from the skies three times a day. Manna, you know. The Watcher takes fine care of us. You got here around the time of the afternoon fall, but you were up there in your haze while we ate. It's almost time for the third fall of the day now.”

The red sun had faded considerably now, and a haunted blue twilight reigned. Thornhill knew enough about solar mechanics to be aware that the big red sun was nearly dead; its feeble bulk gave little light. Fierce radiation came from the blue sun, but distance afforded protection. How this unlikely pair had come together was a matter for conjecture—some star capture in eons past, no doubt.

White flakes drifted slowly downward. As they came, Thornhill saw the Spican hoist its bulk hastily from the ground, saw the Regulan running eagerly toward the drifting flakes. McKay stirred; Vellers, the big man, tugged himself to his feet. Only Thornhill and the Aldebaranian looked at all doubtful.

“Suppertime,” La Floquet said cheerfully. He punctuated the statement by snapping a gob of the floating substance from the air with a quick, sharp gesture and cramming it into his mouth.

The others, Thornhill saw, were likewise catching the food before it touched ground. The animals of the Valley were appearing—the fat, lazy-looking ruminants, the whippetlike dogs, the catlike creatures—and busily were devouring the manna from the ground.

Thornhill shrugged and shagged a mass as it hung before him in the air. After a tentative sniff he hesitantly swallowed a mouthful.

It was like chewing cloud stuff—except that this cloud had a tangy, wine-like taste; his stomach felt soothed almost immediately. He wondered how such unsubstantial stuff could possibly be nourishing. Then he stopped wondering and helped himself to a second portion, then a third.

The fall stopped finally, and by then Thornhill was sated. He lay outstretched on the ground, legs thrust out, head propped up against a boulder.

Opposite him was McKay. The thin, pale man was smiling. “I haven't eaten this way in years,” he said. “Haven't had much of an appetite. But now—”

“Where are you from?” Thornhill asked, interrupting.

“Earth, originally. Then to Mars when my heart began acting up. They thought the low gravity would help me, and of course it did. I'm a professor of medieval Terran history. That is, I
was
—I was on a medical leave until—until I came here.” He smiled complacently. “I feel reborn here, you know? If only I had some books—”

“Shut up,” growled Vellers. “You'd stay here forever, wouldn't you, now?”

The big man lay near the water's edge staring moodily out over the river.

“Of course I would,” snapped McKay testily. “And Miss Hardin, too, I'd wager.”

“If we could leave the two of you here together, I'm sure you'd be very happy,” came the voice of La Floquet. “But we can't do that. Either all of us stay, or all of us get out of here.”

The argument appeared likely to last all night. Thornhill looked away. The three aliens seemed to be as far from each other as possible, the Spican lying in a horizontal position looking like a great inflated balloon that had somehow come to rest, the little Regulan brooding in the distance and fingering its heavy dewlap, the Aldebaranian sitting quietly to one side listening to every word, smiling like a pudgy Buddha.

Thornhill rose. He bent over Marga Fallis and said, “Would you care to take a walk with me.”

She hesitated just a moment. “I'd love to,” she said.

They stood at the edge of the water watching the swift stream, watching golden fish flutter past with solemnly gaping mouths. After a while they walked on upstream, back toward the rise in the ground that led to the hills, which in turn rose into the two mighty peaks.

Thornhill said, “That La Floquet. He's a funny one, isn't he? Like a little gamecock, always jumping around and ready for a fight.”

“He's very dynamic,” Marga agreed quietly.

“You and he were the first ones here, weren't you? It must have been strange, just the two of you in this little Eden, until the third one showed up.” Thornhill wondered why he was probing after these things. Jealousy, perhaps? Not
perhaps
. Certainly.

“We really had very little time alone together. McKay came right after me, and then the Spican. The Watcher was very busy collecting.”

“Collecting,
” Thornhill repeated. “That's all we are. Just specimens collected and put here in this Valley like little lizards in a terrarium. And this Watcher—some strange alien being, I guess.” He looked up at the starless sky, still bright with day. “There's no telling what's in the stars. Five hundred years of space travel, and we haven't seen it all.”

Marga smiled. She took his hand, and they walked on farther into the low-lying shrubbery, saying nothing. Thornhill finally broke the silence.

“You said you were an astronomer, Marga?”

“Not really.” Her voice was low for a woman's and well modulated; he liked it. “I'm attached to the Bellatrix VII observatory, but strictly as an assistant. I've got a degree in astronomy, of course. But I'm just sort of hired help in the observatory.”

“Is that where you were when—when—”

“Yes,” she said. “I was in the main dome taking some plates out of the camera. I remember it was a very delicate business. A minute or two before it happened, someone called me on the main phone downstairs, and they wanted to transfer the call up to me. I told them it would have to wait; I couldn't be bothered until I'd finished with my plates. And then everything blanked out, and I guess my plates don't matter now. I wish I'd taken that call, though.”

“Someone important?”

“Oh—no. Nothing like that.”

Somehow Thornhill felt relieved. “What about La Floquet?” he asked. “Who is he?”

“He's sort of a big-game hunter,” she said. “I met him once before when he led a party to Bellatrix VII. Imagine the odds on any two people in the universe meeting twice! He didn't recognize me, of course, but I remembered him. He's not easy to forget.”

“He
is
sort of picturesque,” Thornhill said.

“And you? You said you owned a mine on Vengamon.”

“I do. I'm actually quite a dull person,” said Thornhill. “This is the first interesting thing that's ever happened to me.” He grinned wryly. “The fates caught up with me with a vengeance, though. I guess I'll never see Vengamon again now. Unless La Floquet can get us out of here, and I don't think he can.”

“Does it matter? Will it pain you never to go back to Vengamon?”

“I doubt it,” Thornhill said. “I can't see any urgent reason for wanting to go back. And you, and your observatory?”

“I can forget my observatory soon enough,” she said.

Somehow he moved closer to her; he wished it were a little darker, perhaps even that the Watcher would choose this instant to arrive and afford a shield of privacy for him for a moment. He felt her warmth against him.

“Don't,” she murmured suddenly. “Someone's coming.”

She pulled away from him. Scowling, Thornhill turned and saw the stubby figure of La Floquet clambering toward them.

“I do hope I'm not interrupting any tender scenes,” the little man said quietly.

“You might have been,” Thornhill admitted. “But the damage is done. What's happened to bring you after us? The charm of our company?”

“Not exactly. There's trouble down below. Vellers and McKay had a fight.”

“Over leaving the Valley?”

“Of course.” La Floquet looked strangely disturbed. “Vellers hit him a little too hard, though. He killed him.”

Marga gasped. “McKay's dead?”

“Very. I don't know what we ought to do with Vellers. I wanted you two in on it.”

Hastily Thornhill and Marga followed La Floquet down the side of the hill toward the little group clumped on the beach. Even at a distance Thornhill could see the towering figure of Vellers staring down at his feet where the crumpled body of McKay lay.

They were still a hundred feet away when McKay rose suddenly to his feet and hurled himself on Vellers in a wild headlong assault.

Chapter Three

Thornhill froze an instant and grasped La Floquet's cold wrist.

“I thought you told me he was dead?”

“He
was,
” La Floquet insisted. “I've seen dead men before. I know the face, the eyes, the slackness of the lips—Thornhill, this is impossible!”

They ran toward the beach. Vellers had been thrown back by the fury of the resurrected McKay's attack; he went tumbling over, with McKay groping for his throat in blind murderousness.

But Vellers' strength prevailed. As Thornhill approached, the big man plucked McKay off him with one huge hand, held him squirming in the air an instant, and rising to his feet, hurled McKay down against a beach boulder with sickening impact. Vellers staggered back, muttering hoarsely to himself.

Thornhill stared down. A gash had opened along the side of McKay's head; blood oozed through the sparse graying hair, matting it. McKay's eyes, half-open, were glazed and sightless; his mouth hung agape, tongue lolling. The skin of his face was gray.

Kneeling, Thornhill touched his hand to McKay's wrist, then to the older man's lips. After a moment he looked up. “This time he's really dead,” he said.

La Floquet was peering grimly at him. “Get out of the way!” he snapped suddenly, and to Thornhill's surprise he found himself being roughly grabbed by the shoulder and flung aside by the wiry game hunter.

Quickly La Floquet flung himself down on McKay's body, straddling it with his knees pressing against the limp arms, hands grasping the slender shoulders. The beach was very silent; La Floquet's rough, irregular breathing was the only sound. The little man seemed poised, tensed for a physical encounter.

The gash on McKay's scalp began to heal.

Thornhill watched as the parted flesh closed over; the bruised skin lost its angry discoloration. Within moments only the darkening stain of blood on McKay's forehead gave any indication that there had been a wound.

Then McKay's slitted eyelids closed and immediately reopened, showing bright, flashing eyes that rolled wildly. Color returned to the dead man's face. Like a riding whip suddenly turned by conjury into a serpent, McKay began to thrash frantically. But La Floquet was prepared. His muscles corded momentarily as he exerted pressure; McKay writhed but could not rise. Behind him Thornhill heard Vellers mumbling a prayer over and over again while the mousy Miss Hardin provided a counterpoint of harsh sobs; even the Regulan uttered a brief comment in his guttural, consonant-studded language.

Sweat beaded La Floquet's face, but he prevented McKay from repeating his previous wild charge. Perhaps a minute passed; then McKay relaxed visibly.

La Floquet remained cautiously astride him. “McKay? McKay, do you hear me? This is La Floquet.”