The Forerunner Factor (21 page)

“If I can find where that—where he saw it—” Thorn said, slowly, “then I shall take you there. If we come forth from this venture still alive.”

She looked down at the Simsa in the block. He was right—she might want passionately to find this, but perhaps death stood in their way. Still, this much she had and it gave her a fierce joy of possession as she looked upon it.

12

Though the storm still rolled overhead, and there had been at least one more crashing fall of stone in the outer part of this great chamber, Simsa sat at ease. In one hand, she held a small container which Thorn had given her after showing her how to twist the upper part a little and then wait for a short time so that when it was fully opened, what it held was hot as if just poured from some inn kettle. She savored the rich contents, picking out bits which she handed down to the eagerly reaching paws of the zorsals, the three gathered before her and watching each bite she transferred to her mouth. Off-world food, with a savor she had never dreamed that any food could have.

Thorn had another such can by this knee where he, too, sat cross-legged. Only his attention was not for the food, but rather for the sounds made by the small box he had told her might contain any message his brother might have left. The sounds were not speech as Simsa recognized as such, rather a series of clicks as one might rap out with a bit of metal against stone. At her comment, before he had waved her impatiently to be still, Thorn said that this was a secret way of message sending and only one trained could make sense of those clicks.

The girl yawned as she scooped out the last large piece of food, then put the can down so that the zorsals squabbled over the chance to lick out its interior with their long tongues. She would have liked to have explored, poked into the remaining boxes and containers. On the other hand, she also felt drowsy and, for the first time since she had left the pool, at ease and content. That the camp had not been looted, Thorn had said, meant that his brother had not been either killed or taken captive here. Thus, he appeared to believe that they were safe also—at least for now.

Simsa stretched out, turned her head a little so she could watch those lines of patterns across the wall. Among them she searched for that symbol connected with the other Simsa. Only it appeared nowhere here, at least not within the range of her sight. Then the clicking came to a sudden stop and she looked toward the off-worlder.

He had picked up the box with the message, was sitting with that closed-face look which she knew meant he was thinking.

“What did it tell you?” This silence had stretched too long—she wanted to know. Perhaps within those clicks was even the secret of what meant the most to her.

“He discovered that he had been followed. He had made a find—Arth—Forerunner—Then he saw the ship. There was enough about it—though he did not give details—to make him afraid that it might be the wreck of a war spacer. It was hot—radioactive—but he thought not too high for one of our blood to explore. He scouted and found indications that there had been others before him. Some of them, at least, were desert people; he discovered at least two bodies of those.”

“Only,” the off-worlder sat back on his heels, interlacing his fingers and turning them in and out, his eyes upon their movement as if so he worked some kind of fortune producing ritual, “he also came across signs that there had been another landing by several smaller ships—and not long ago. There had been a camp near there. A meeting place for those of this world . . . and others. Jacks!” The last word came as an explosion.

“Who or what are Jacks?” she pulled herself up. To learn all that from a series of clicks! But this was another starman’s thing and so it could be true.

“Outlaws,” he returned. “Just as you have pirates on your seas, so do we have their like along the star lanes. Such could provide the means for looting that war spacer. They would do so if the price was high enough. They have been and gone, but they had also left a beacon, something such as that—” he gestured to the lamp, “but of a different kind, in that it can be heard off-world by the ship for which it is set. When they left the beacon it meant they planned to return. It could be that they did not have equipment enough to start scavenging, or it might be that they needed more help, or—” He waved his hand as if there could be ten-ten reasons for such a visit and a promised return.

“They might want what they found for themselves; then the Guilds have nothing to do with this.”

Thorn shook his head. “That camp my brother found remains of was laid out first by men of this world—the others were visitors. Also, it was set up several seasons ago and, therefore, whoever dealt with the Jacks knew well enough what lay here. Only that they themselves could not yet make use of it.”

“If they knew, say, Lord Arfellen . . .” Simsa began once more to fit piece to piece in her mind. “Then why did they let your brother come here? He was off-world, he would know at once that this wreck of a ship was a bad thing. They could have easily killed him before he reached the Hills at all—”

“Unless they dared not report a death near their own territory—even by accident—of an off-worlder. My brother was no common man and the League and the Patrol keep their watch on all of us, especially when we come to hunt out Forerunner remains—or things X-Arth. Can you understand, Simsa? It is not the actual worth of bits of broken stone, or this,” he tapped the cuff he still wore, “which matter. We seek out all we can learn because we must!

“My people spread out from Arth itself so many seasons ago that you would have difficulty in counting time. We found worlds with others living there—some were strange of body, stranger yet of mind. Some were enough like ourselves that we could interbreed. Other worlds were empty of life, yet held broken cities, strange machines, mysteries left by intelligent beings.

“All we can learn we must, for there were many, many powers which rose among the stars—and then fell. Some fell by war—we have discovered worlds which have been burnt black, holding only ashes—the result of the use of such weapons as we have come to fear and have outlawed. But also there were other worlds where all that remained appeared as if those who dwelt there had simply walked away and left great wonders to be toppled by the fingers of time.

“Why did they rise to power and fall? If we can learn only a little of their past, then we can foresee the way of our own future, at least in part. Perhaps some of the acts which brought them down we can then avoid.”

“There is one world in our League where all such finds are gathered to be studied. The race who live there—who are so long-lived a species that to them our oldest known are but infants—study these finds, try to learn. Sometimes they themselves are the searchers, more often it is we of other species and races who collect the knowledge for them. Such a searcher was my brother—and he had much experience in these matters. When the first starships landing here brought back fragments of a much older time, and our traders brought ever more, he was chosen to come and see—to make records—report whether the remains here were such as would warrant sending in a whole ship of trained people to deal with them.”

“My Simsa”—she still thought of the picture as that—“was she of your Forerunners? These people who rose and then fell, who knew once the stars and then lost them?”

“Perhaps—those symbols make it seem likely. Or she could be one born of this world who learned of such from other star rovers—those who were star rovers before my people lifted from their own world at all. I know now where T’seng found her.”

“Where? Let us go there!”

“If you wish—” he sounded almost indifferent. He was more intent, she must accept, on his own search, the plans he must make. “In the morning,” he added.

Simsa knew she must be content with that. Though she longed to set out at once, he had risen, gone to the lamp. Now he passed across it a disc he had taken from his belt. The light winked out. As its going, the zorsals stirred and the girl gave the signal which would post them as sentries.

She was sure that she could not sleep—that the need to see that other Simsa was so aching, tearing a feeling that she could not rest. But sleep lay in wait for her after all.

She awoke to the sound of water. Grey light from beyond the rock walls of the campsite shined through the broken dome so far overhead with the brightness of at least an hour past dawn. Across the camp’s space Thorn lay, the arm with the cuff covering his eyes as if he had gone to sleep trying to shut out some sight he must rid himself of—at least for a while.

Simsa heard a soft chitter. The three zorsals were roosting on the top of one of the rocks, their softer, sleepy voices signifying they were settling for sleep. She got to her knees and looked out into the center of this space which was larger than any building in all of Kuxortal.

Now, in the better light, she could see that it was oval in form and that ranked above this covered, arched way which appeared to rim completely around the oval, were tiers of ledges, as if those had once furnished seats or resting places. People must have gathered here for some purpose. Probably to view action in the center where those lumps of broken masonry had crashed to crumble. She had never seen such a place and she wondered what could possibly bring so many people together—if all those ledges had once been filled.

The water she had heard running—that was funneled off from the ledges and the broken dome, gathering in a channel not too far from the camp. Simsa crawled over the rock barrier and went to it. It seemed clear and drinkable. She palmed up some, went back to offer it to Zass, who obligingly lapped her tongue twice across the girl’s palm, thus declaring it all right. All that talk of plague from Thorn’s “radiation” warning made Simsa doubly cautious, but now she drank and found it good.

“Fair morning to you, Lady Simsa—”

She had been trying to comb her tangled hair with her fingers, now she looked over her shoulder and smiled. Her waking here had seemed so lacking in care, as if they were safe in spite of all Thorn’s tales. She found herself light of heart again, as she had been when she had left the pool.

There was something else she noted with a small inner surprise. When he had called her “Lady” before, she had believed he had jeered at her, making it plain she was of the Burrowers, but—now—that title seemed right.

“It is a fair morning, Lord Thorn—” she agreed. “If you will toss me that water container, I can fill it before last night’s bounty runs dry.”

Already the run-off water stream was diminishing in size.

He did just as she had suggested, she using her lightning skill to snatch it out of the air, catching at its cording so it swung around her arm. This easily carried piece of equipment also had been among their finds the night before, and Simsa had guessed that its being left there was one more reason her companion believed in his brother’s death.

She filled, rinsed, and filled it again. If they were to go on (she had already marshaled facts and plans), they could not burden themselves with the unwieldy and hard to handle carrier. Instead, they must draw upon the camp equipment. It would appear that was just what Thorn was prepared to do. Those things which had been in the one pack he had opened and explored so fully, he laid into a hamper, filling the first with ration tins and other things he sought from here and there among all which had been stored in the camp.

That light-weight, very tough, and yet silken-smooth square which had served as a folded pillow for Simsa was trussed to form a second pack which Thorn fussed over until he was sure that it would ride easily on her back. As he worked, he explained the use of some of the things they must carry. There were direction finders which would pick up those trail markings T’seng had set up leading Thorn along his brother’s explored paths. In addition were some small, round balls Thorn explained were to be pressed at one end and then tossed. Almost instantly thereafter they loosed clouds of mist that would overpower any animal or unprotected humanoid creature. There were only four of these, but Thorn divided them, insisting that Simsa carry her pair in sleeve pockets she could easily reach.

She had already turned out of her right one the bag of silver bits—useless here, weighing her down when she could well need an extra lightness of arm.

When the packs were both put together, Thorn picked up the case into which he had fitted with great care all his brother had left behind in the way of information. As she stood waiting, Simsa thought she knew what he would ask for next. She put her hand protectively over that “picture” which she had wrapped in a sheet of thin protective stuff which had been rolled and cased to protect the mist balls. That was hers—she would not give it up. Thorn glanced at her, perhaps he read her determination, for he did not ask her to return it. Rather, he picked up the now lightless lamp, setting its broad base on the package he had fastened, carefully fitting it into place.

At first, Simsa did not quite realize the significance of his act. Then she took a long stride forward to stand beside him.

“You leave this so—because you believe we shall not return?”

“I believe nothing!” he retorted impatiently. “I only do what is customary.”

“One man,” she said, “went from this camp and you think died.”

He did not answer. She needed no answer. Still her confidence was not shaken. There was always death. If one feared that constantly one had no time for life. One had this day—that was enough to concern one’s thoughts.

They left the camp, Zass perched sleepily on Simsa’s pack, each of the other two zorsals on a shoulder. When Thorn had offered to take their weight, she explained that they would not go to him, nor to anyone else.

The way was smooth enough walking and her well calloused feet had been rested, renewed and strengthened by the pool. He need not fear that she could not keep up with him, and she told him so.

Their door out of the huge chamber of the dome came soon enough, another passage opening to their left. Thorn entered without question, Simsa a step or so behind. This was so short a way that the light ahead, which was now sun bright, showed her once more those statues leaning outward from the wall which had given her such a fright the night before. She looked at each eagerly, hoping to discover some resemblance to her picture—but these were like the faces on the upper walls. A number were beasts of one kind or another, none she recognized, only that they seemed to be uniform in that they all showed fangs, claws, or gave the impression of being about to leap upon and slash down some weaker prey.