Naill leaned against the supporting haft of the big stripping ax. On his body, bare to the waist, silver dust was puddled into patches by sweat. Overhead the sun, which had seemed so pale on that first day of his arrival, proved its force with waves of heat. His head turned, as it so often had these past weeks, toward the cool green of the woods they were attacking. The dim reaches of dark green were as promising as a pool into which a man could plunge his sweating, heat-seared body—to relax, to dream.
Kosburg had lost no time, after their arrival at this Fringe garth, in outlining to his new hands all the dire dangers of that woodland which beckoned so enticingly. And not the least of those perils was marked by the solitary, ruined hut he had shown them, well within one strip of forest that licked out into his painfully freed acres. It was now cursed land, which no man would dare to trouble. That hut—they viewed it from a safe distance—had been, and still was, the tomb of a sinner, one who had offended so greatly against the Sky as to be struck down by the Green Sick.
The Believers did not kill—no, they simply abandoned to the chill loneliness of the forest those who contracted that incurable disease, which was sent to them as a punishment. And what sufferer raving in the high fever of the first stages could survive alone and untended in the wild? Also—who knew what other dangers lurked under the shadow of the great trees? There were the monsters, seen from time to time, always viewed in the early morning before the sun's rising, or in the twilight.
Naill wondered about those "monsters." The stories Kosburg's household related with a relish were wild enough, but the creature or creatures described were surely born from over-vivid imaginations. The tales agreed only upon the fact that the unknown was nearly the same color as the vegetation wherein it sheltered and that it had four limbs. As to whether it walked erect on two, or ran on four, the information appeared to be divided. And against it the hounds of the garths had an abiding hate.
Curiosity was not one of the character traits the settlers either possessed or encouraged. Naill's first fears concerning the society on Janus had been fully substantiated. The belief of the Sky Lovers was a narrow, fiercely reactionary one. Those living on the garths might well have stepped back a thousand years or more into the past history of their kind.
There was no desire to learn anything of the native Janus, only dogged, day-in, day-out efforts to tame the land, make it conform to their own off-world pattern of life. Where another type of settler would have gone exploring into the vastness of the forest lands, the Sky Lovers shunned the woods, except when armed with ax, lopping knife, shovel, and the thirst for breaking, chopping, digging.
"You—Renfro—bend to it!"
That was Lasja tramping into the half-hacked clearing, his own ax across his shoulder. He had been the longest in Kosburg's labor service and so took upon himself the hustling of the latest comers. Behind him came Tylos carrying a slopping water bucket, his face puckered in an attempt to act out the pain such a vast effort cost him.
The ex-crook from Korwar was striving to use every wile and trick he had learned in his spotted past to make life for himself as easy as he could. His first day at clearing had brought him back early to the garthstead with a swollen ankle from what Naill thought was a carefully calculated misstroke of a grubbing hook. Hobbling about the buildings, he then strove to ingratiate himself in the kitchen and weaving house, his quick, sly tongue as busy as his hands were slow, until the womenfolk of Kosburg's establishment accepted him as part of their aids to labor. So he escaped the fields, though Naill, having heard the flaying tongue of the mistress of the household in full flap, doubted whether Tylos had won the better part.
Now he leaned against the bole of a fallen tree and smirked behind Lasja's broad back, winking at Naill as the latter began to shape up one of the waiting logs.
"Seen any of them monsters?" he asked as Naill paused and came over for a drink. "Reckon their hides might bring a good price down to the port, was anyone smart enough to take him out a pair of hounds and do a little huntin'."
His half suggestion only pointed up the thought that was at the back of all newcomers' minds—the driving hope of somehow managing to get some trade goods independently, to build up credits at the port and some day—no matter how far away—to earn one's freedom.
Lasja scowled. "You stow that! Ain't never goin' to get any trade goods—you know that, scuttle-bug. Anything you get—or find—belongs to the garthmaster—and don't you go to forget that! Want to be judged a first-degree sinner and have the Speaker reckon with you?"
Naill glanced over the rim of the wooden dipper. "What could a man get—or find—around here, Lasja, that's worth bringing in a Speaker?"
Lasja's scowl blackened. "Sinful things," he muttered.
Naill allowed the dipper to splash back into the bucket. He was aware of Sim Tylos's sudden start, stilling instantly into watchful waiting. When the big man did not continue, it was Tylos who asked the question in both their minds.
"Sinful things, eh? And what're them, Lasja? We don't want to get no Speaker on our backs—better tell us what we ain't to pick up, if we are findin' of 'em. Or else, do we get into trouble, we can say as how we was never told no different. This Kosburg, he's a terror on two legs, all right, only he might listen to us sayin' somethin' like that."
Tylos was right. Stern and narrow as was the garthdwellers' creed, their sense of justice still worked—justice, not mercy, of course. Lasja paused, his ax still upraised. His lower lip pushed out so that he had the side profile of some awkward, off-world bird thing—round head, outthrust bill.
"All right—all right!" He brought down the ax mightily and then let the haft slip through his hand until the head rested on the chip-littered ground. "Sometimes, men workin' out to clear the forest—they find things . . ."
"What kind of things?" Naill took up the questioning.
But Lasja's discomfort was growing. "Things—well, you might say as how they was like treasures."
"Treasures!" Tylos broke out and then clamped his pale lips tightly together, though his avid interest blazed in his narrowed eyes.
"What kind of treasures?" Naill asked.
"I don't know—just things—rich-lookin'."
"What happens to 'em?" Tylos's tongue stopped its passage across his lips long enough for him to ask.
"The Speaker comes and they break 'em all to bits—burn 'em."
"Why?" Naill demanded.
"'Cause they're cursed, that's why! Anybody as touches 'em is cursed too."
Tylos laughed. "That's rich, that is. 'Course they're cursed, do we find 'em. We might just take 'em down to the port and buy ourselves free. But why smash 'em up? They could use some treasure here—import some machines so we don't have to go on breakin' our backs cuttin' down trees and grubbin' out stuff."
Lasja shot him a hard glance. "You ain't breakin' your back none, Tylos. And the Sky Lovers don't use no machines. Anyway—does a man try to hold out on treasure and they learn it, he gets put out there"—he jerked a thumb at the forest—"alone—no grub, no tools, nothin' but his bare hands. And you ain't sellin' nothin' at the port. You don't get to the port less'n they make sure they's nothin' a man's got on him but his clothes over his bare skin. No—they's right—that treasure's not for the takin'. When it's found, the finder sings out, and loud, too."
"Where does it come from? I thought this was an empty world, no native race," Naill said.
"Sure—never found no people here. Funny thing—I've heard a lotta talk. This here planet's been known for about a hundred years, planet time. The Karbon Combine bid it in at the first Survey auction—just on spec. That was before the war—long before. But they didn't do much more than just hold it on their books—sent in a couple of explorin' parties who didn't see more'n trees, messes of trees all over the place. There's a couple of narrow little seas—all the rest forest. No minerals has registered high enough to pay for exportin'—nothin' but a lotta wood.
"Then, when it looked like the Combines were stretchin' too far, mosta them started unloadin' worlds what didn't pay—gettin' rid of 'em to settlers. These Sky Lovers—they were over on some hard-soiled scrap of an overbaked world which gave 'em a hardscrabble livin'. Somehow they got the down payment for Karbon and jumped the gulf to here. Then—when the war broke—well, then they had it made. Karbon holdin's were all enemy then—they cracked wide open and nobody came around here askin' for what was still owin'. Far's I know, the Sky Lovers have Janus free and clear all to their selves. They get out lattamus and bark enough to keep the port open and themselves on the trade map.
"That's all the history we know. And there's never been no sign of natives, just these treasures turnin' up every once in a while. No pattern to that neither, no ruins—nothin' to say as how there was ever anythin' here but trees. And those've been growin'—some of 'em—nigh onto two thousand planet years! Might just be that this was some sort of a hideout for raiders or such once. But they ain't never found no marks of a ship landin' neither. The Sky Lovers, they have it that the treasures are planted by the Dark One just to make a man sin, and so far they ain't found nothin' to prove that wrong."
Tylos laughed scornfully. "Silly way of thinkin'!"
"Maybe—but it's theirs and they've got the say here," Lasja warned.
"Did you ever really see any such treasure?" Naill went back to his stripping job.
"Once—over on Morheim's Garth. He's to the south, next holding. That was last fall, just when we was doin' the season burnin'. Was his son as found it. They had the Speaker in right away—rounded us all up for the prayin' and the breakin'. Didn't do 'em much good, though—only kinda proved their point about it bein' sinful."
"How?"
"'Cause just about a week of days later, that same son as found it—he came down with the Green Sick. They carted him off to the forest then. I was one of the guards they set for the watchin'."
"The watching?"
"Yeah. With the Green Sick they go plumb outta their heads—sometimes they run wild. Can't let 'em get back where there's people. They touch you and you get it too. So if they try to break back, you rope 'em—pull 'em in and tie 'em to some tree."
"Leave sick people that way to die!" Naill stared at Lasja.
"There ain't nothin' as can be done for 'em—no cure at all. And the port medico says as how they could infect the whole lot of us. Sometimes their folks give 'em a sleep drink so they just die that way. But that ain't right, accordin' to the Speakers. They ought to be made known as how they's sinned. And, lissen here, boy, the Green Sick ain't nothin' to want—nor to look at neither. You ain't human no more, once it begins on you." Lasja chopped at the tree. "They say as how it never touches no one 'less he's broken some sorta rule of theirs—been different somehow. That Morheim boy—he was lessoned once or twice by his father, right out before the whole garth—for doin' wrong. So when he took sick, it was a judgment, like."
"You believe that?" Naill asked.
Lasja shrugged. "Seen it work that way—or heard as how it does. Them what takes the Green Sick, they's all had some trouble with the Rule. Once it was a girl as was kinda queer in the head—used to want to go into the forest, said as how she liked the trees. She got lessoned good for wanderin' off. Just a little thing she was, not full growed yet. They found her burnin' up in her bed place one night—took her right off to the woods. It weren't pretty—she cried a lot. And her mother—she was Kosburg's second woman—she took on somethin' awful. Old man had her locked up for a couple weeks—till he was sure it was all over."
Naill chopped savagely. "Why didn't they just kill her? Would have been kinder!"
Lasja grunted. "They don't figure so. Bein' kind to her body wouldn't save her spirit. She had to die hard in order to get rid of her sin. They think as if a man don't die in the Clear—as they calls it—he'll be in the Shadow always. If you sin big, you have to pay for it. Makes for a lot of hard dealin' one way or another sometimes. You can't change their way of thinkin' and it's best not to meddle. They hold that lessonin's good for everyone, not just those that believe. Now—we've had enough jawin'! You, Tylos, make tracks with that bucket to the splittin' ground. Tell the garthmaster as how we have a load 'bout ready. And don't you linger none on the way, neither."
Tylos, his bucket slopping, hurried as long as he was in Lasja's sight. Probably that scuttle would drop to a crawl as soon as he put a screen of brush between them. Since the usually taciturn Lasja seemed in an open-jawed mood, Naill determined to make the most of the opportunity to learn what he could.
"Lasja, has anyone ever bought free here?"
"Bought free?" The axman appeared to jerk out of some private path of thought. He grinned. "You needn't wear yourself out, boy, thinkin' 'bout that. Iffen you can shoulder a phas and trot him twice 'round the garth—then you can think of buyin' free. This is a dirt-poor world—and Kosburg's in an outer-Fringe holdin'. He ain't goin' to let loose of any pair of hands he gets. Not while they can still work, that is. You're right puny, but you ain't no shirk like Tylos. You do a day's work right enough. Me—I was prisoner of war on Avalon. They came 'round to the camp and made labor offers. I took that—better than stayin' in and goin' mad with bein' cooped up. When I came here—sure, I had big ideas about doin' my time and buyin' free. Only—this is the way of it—all the land, every stinkin' wood-rotten bit of it, belongs to the Sky, accordin' to their reckonin'. And only a true Believer can get rights to take up a garth. And—this is the trick star in their game—you can't be no true Believer 'less you was born so. They made them a pact, when they took off from that mistake of a world where they was roostin' before, that they wouldn't let in no disturbin' outsiders with different ideas. So you gotta be born a Believer, you can't up and say as how you'd like to join 'em now.
"Once here, they've got you tighter'n an air-lock door. You can go up against 'em and get yourself lessoned—or maybe thrown out in the woods—but they've got you just where it suits 'em! Now, you do that there smoothin' down. We'd better have a fair load for the old man when he comes sniffin' 'round."
How far were they from the port? A good day's travel in one of the phas-drawn carts—maybe longer on foot. And how could anyone work out an escape even if he were able to reach that single tie with space? To hire passage on a spacer would cost indeed a "treasure"; to try to work some deal with any ship's commander to be taken on as crew would be useless. The sympathies of the officers would all be with the master one was trying to escape. And if there was no system of legal buyfree . . . Naill dug savagely with the point of his ax against the hard wood. He hated to believe that Lasja's gloomy report was the truth, but it sounded likely.
"You take that rope." Lasja broke into his assistant's train of discouraging thought. "And drag out another of them logs. You can plunk it 'bout here."
Naill put down the ax and went back into where the trees had been felled during the past two days. He was still out of the coverage of the full forest, but the mass of greenery, just beginning to wilt, was somehow refreshing. There was a different feel here to the land, smells that were aromatic, free from the taint of human living. On impulse he stripped off handfuls of silver-green leaves, their touch fur-soft against his damp skin as he held them close to his nose and drank in a spicy fragrance.
He was filled with a sudden desire to keep on going into the domain of the trees. What if a man did take to the woods? That would mean becoming an outlaw in unknown country. But was that state so much worse than garth life? His mind nibbled at that as he hunched down to knot the rope about a tree trunk. The twist of cordage cut cruelly into his shoulder on the first pull. There was resistance, too much. Naill knelt again, saw a branch had cut into a soft place in the ground and pinned the tree fast there.
With his lopping knife he set to work digging that free. Sunlight lay in ragged patches. And something blazed with leaping light where he dug. Naill clawed out loose handfuls of moist loam and uncovered what lay beneath.
He blinked. Lasja's stories had not prepared him for this. And truly—what was it? A figure of—was it a tree?—a ball, a box, a rod the length of his palm and perhaps two inches thick, a necklace spilling a circlet of green-fire droplets on the gray soil.
Naill's hand closed upon the rod, brought it into full sight.
He drew a deep breath of pure wonder. There had been so many years of drabness, of ugliness. And now he could not give name to what he held in his hand. The substance was cold, with the pleasant coolness of springwater cupped in a sweaty hand to be brought to a thirsty mouth. It was all light—green, gold, opaline—jeweled light. It was a form—in traceries of patterns—to entrance, to enchant the eyes. It was a fabulous wonder that was his! His!
Moved by some instinctive fear, Naill sat half crouched, looking about him. Smashed, burned—that was what Lasja said was done to such things! Sure—that was part of their narrow world. Break beauty, destroy it, as they broke and destroyed the beauty of the Forest. He had not the slightest hope of keeping the entire treasure: he had no desire to. But this rod—this tube with all its imprisoned, magic splendor—that was not going to be broken!
Lasja would be along any moment, and Naill had no doubt about the other's reaction. He'd call Kosburg at once. Where—where was a hiding place?
He balled his fist tightly about his treasure. The woods—perhaps he could find a place of concealment there. Naill got to his feet, stole into the shadow of the trees, and saw there on the bole of one a dark hole. He thrust the tube into that hollow just as Lasja called from close at hand.
Naill leaped, kicked soil back, took up the rope to pull as the other came into view. He dared not turn his head to see how much dirt his kicks had replaced, whether he had again concealed the rest of the treasure.
"You empty-skulled lackwit!" Lasja bore down upon him. "Whatta you doin', pullin' out your guts that way? You got a limb caught under that thing!"
The older man went down on one knee to dig with his lopping knife, just as Naill had done before him. Then that busy arm paused. Lasja tumbled away as if he had just laid hand on a lurking jacata worm. He scrambled to his feet and grabbed Naill, propelling him away from the tree. And at the same time he gave a carrying call that would summon Kosburg. It was plain Lasja was obeying the Rule.