His hiding place, Naill speedily discovered, had been carefully chosen by those who had first used it as an observation post. It gave him a good view of the clearing. The working party that came there now was smaller than those Kosburg had mustered. There were only two slave laborers, and three bearded Believers, one of those hardly more than a boy, his beard a few silky straggles on his chin.
They began to work well away from the brambles that masked the trap, and the garthmaster kept them busy with a vigor and concentration that suggested that he, like Kosburg, ruled the holding with an iron-rooted will. The labor of clearing was the same Naill had sweated over, but inside him now a new anger coiled and raised. This destruction of what was right and good to make more ugly bareness! He realized his fingers had curved about the hilt of that leaf-bladed sword, that he was eyeing hotly the leader of that work gang.
To remain where he was could be the rankest folly, and yet he was held there by that curiosity, the need for knowing what would happen if and when the treasure was found. Would one of those laborers uncover the cache out of sight of his master and seek to conceal part of it for his own?
Naill was so intent upon watching the workers that he missed the arrival of a second small group at the edge of the clearing. And he was startled to see suddenly the flap of a skirt.
His first impression of the womenfolk of the Believers had been that they courted dour plainness with the diligence with which off-world women strove to develop the current ideal of beauty. Their sacklike clothing, fashioned of the same dull browns, shabby grays, and sullen black-greens the men also wore, carefully concealed any hint of form, while their hair was screwed back into tightly netted knots. Away from their own hearthsides they followed the dictates of the Rule and went masked, a strip of cloth with holes for eyes, nose, and mouth rendering them both anonymous and safely hideous.
Not that they ever ventured very far from the buildings of the garth. In all the time Naill had been at Kosburg's, he had never seen any of the women farther afield than the stableyard, except driving, fully masked and covered with additional muffling cloaks and hoods, to the weekly Sky Stand of the elect.
But here a woman escorted three smaller figures, all masked. Baskets on arm, they were heading toward the berry-hung bushes.
"Ho!" The garthmaster upped his ax for a swing, to drop it without delivering the full blow. He was no giant to match Kosburg, but a thin, active man, and the forward-thrusting beard he displayed was fair and lank.
The woman stopped, turned to face him, her smaller companions retreating a little behind her as if cowed by such public notice of their being. They remained so while the garthmaster climbed a fallen tree trunk and came to them.
"What do you do here, girl?" he demanded.
One work-reddened hand gestured at the heavy harvest of berries.
"These will be uprooted soon." Her voice was low, without expression. "There is no need to waste this present crop."
The garthmaster considered that point, approached the berry bushes closer as if to estimate the value of their wild abundance. Then he nodded.
"Keep to your work, girl," he ordered. "And make haste—we want to clear here before night."
The children scuttled to the picking as he strode away. But for a moment the woman stood where she was, her head now turned to the forest, her eyes, Naill thought, not on the berries at all but on the woodland behind them. Then he saw her do an odd thing—put out her hand and draw one finger down the graceful bend of a stem from which hung a cluster of small white flowers. Her head turned sharply right and left, and then she bent to smell that flowering spray before she went on to strip the berries into her basket in quick, efficient motions.
Whether by chance or design, she pushed her way, picking as she went, until the patch of bramble was a screen between her and the other working party. Then, having added a last handful of fruit to her basket, she set it carefully on the ground and straightened to her full height, once again facing the depths of the forest.
Her hands went to the back of her hood, fumbled with the cords, and she jerked off her mask with an impatient gesture. Her head was up, her chin raised, with a movement into which Naill read defiance.
She had the pallid skin of all garthside women, and her features held no hint of beauty. But she was young, no more than a girl. A high-bridged nose centered above a small mouth, one with thin, pale pink lips. Her eyes were well set, but above them were thick brushes of brows, giving them a harsh and forbidding half frame. No—she was not even remotely pretty by off-world standards, and that alien which was within Naill now found her pale skin repulsively ugly.
Raising her hands, she pressed her palms against her cheeks in a gesture he could not understand. And then, as if some pull beyond control moved her, she walked forward, her clumsy skirts catching and holding on the branches, into the shadow of the trees. Once well hidden by their overhanging branches, she paused once more, standing very still, her head raised. She did not appear to be looking, only waiting, listening. For what Naill could not guess.
Timidly, shyly, her hand came up again to pluck a spray of flowers. She cupped the blossoms in her fingers, bending her head as if she studied some treasure. With a glance over her shoulder, furtive and guilty, she tucked the flowered stem into the front of her robe. Her head up again, her eyes sought now along the green-silver curtain of the woods.
"Ashla?"
The girl's whole body jerked in answer to that call. Her hand went swiftly to the flowers, pulled them loose, and threw them away in what was a single motion of repudiation. Then she was busy adjusting her mask. When she turned to face the child, that covering was safely in place. She beckoned the little girl to her, looked into the other's basket.
"You have done well, Samera," she approved, with a warmth in her tone that had been lacking when she answered the garthmaster. "Tell Illsa and Arma that you may all eat a handful yourselves."
The child's masked face was raised. "Is it allowed?" she asked doubtfully.
"It is allowed, Samera. I shall answer for it."
When the child left, Ashla went back to her picking, moving closer to the laden branch that dipped above the trap. Naill's eyes smarted; the sun broke through here and there—dazzling, too dazzling for his altered sight. Yet he must witness what might happen now. Would she find it? Or would the cache be left for the discovery of a laborer who came to grub up the brush?
The bramble moved closer to her as she tugged it and stripped berries in double handfuls. Then her hands gave a harder tug, bringing up all of the long branch. She stood very still, masked face bent groundward. Her head turned; she glanced in the direction of the children. But they were half hidden, their dull dresses only patches between the bushes. She stooped and caught up a dead branch, dug into the earth with short, quick jabs.
Green fire flashed in so bright a spark that Naill winced, hand to eyes. When he was able to see again, she was holding the necklace before her. No expression could be read behind the enveloping mask, but she had made no sound, given no call to summon the men. Instead she spread out the necklace so its lace of gem drops hung smoothly in graduated rows. Naill, who had given that part of the treasure only passing attention before, could now observe and appreciate its full beauty. If the jewels were real, that garth girl now held a kingdom's ransom, such a necklace as an Empress would wear to her crowning. And he had no reason to believe that they were not stones of price.
Almost as if she had no control over her own desires, Ashla drew the lovely thing to her so those connected rivers of rich green fire now lay on the sacking stuff of her robe, making the coarse material twice as ugly in contrast. Maybe she thought that too, for she quickly held the stones away again. Then, to Naill's surprise, she balled the necklace and wrapped it in a big leaf culled from a nearby plant, tying it into a packet with a twist of grass.
One more glance at the children to make sure of their continued inattention and she pulled her skirts free from the clutch of the bushes to walk on into the woods. A sandaled foot came out from under her voluminous clothing as she dug with heel and toe in the leaf mold, dropped in her prize, and then pulled a stone over the hiding place. It was so speedily and deftly done that Naill might have been witnessing an action performed many times before.
Ashla gave a last searching inspection, then hurried back to the bramble. With her digging branch she recovered the rest of the treasure and was stripping the remainder of the berries when the children came straggling by with their own baskets.
"Ashla!" The call came from the garthmaster, and one of the children caught at the girl's skirt. She nodded a brisk reassurance in that direction and started out of the glade, the children in her wake, heading toward the open fields.
So—even the Believers were not immune to the temptations of the treasure traps! Naill remembered the story of the girl at Kosburg's who had kept running away to the forest until the Green Sick put an end to her "sinning" forever. Had she also secreted some part of a treasure, kept it hidden as he had tried to do, as this Ashla was attempting?
The ring of axes, the loud voices of the workers marked a change of direction. They would soon reach the bramble patch, too near his own lurking place. He must slip farther back into the wood.
Naill found shelter where the ring of axes was only a very distant sound and slept out the rest of the day, rousing after dusk to find a stream and drink. He still had a supply of bread from Iftsiga's supplies and he ate that slowly, savoring its flavor. There was no moon tonight; the wind was soft, moisture laden. Rain coming soon . . .
It might be wise to hole up again and wait out any storm. Yet he wanted to know—had the cache been discovered by those in the clearing? Would they have a guard there now? Or could their fear of the forest by night be determent enough?
Naill approached the clearing with stalker's caution, testing the air with his nose, listening to every sound, as well as using his eyes. The stone Ashla had left to mark the necklace was undisturbed. But beyond, the brambles had been grubbed away and . . .
He caught the enemy scent. Luckily the wind blew in his direction and not away. Ready for trouble, he dodged back in the forest and an instant later heard the coughing bay of a hound, followed by excited shouts from at least two men!
A guard right enough, reinforced by one of the watchdogs. But Naill did not believe they would dare to track him far; their superstitious fear of the thickly treed lands would be doubled at night, and he was certain they had not actually sighted him. The settlers at Kosburg's, at least, had been active in populating the inner woods with unseen enemies. The hound's uproar might be attributed to the prowling of an animal. No hunt would draw them this far.
But guards at the clearing meant that the cache had been discovered, that tomorrow or the next day or the next—whenever the garthmaster could summon a Speaker—the sinful objects would be ceremoniously destroyed and the "sin" of the whole small community purged by fasting and ritual. It would be best to lie low until that was over.
Yet—he had to know if his guess concerning the treasure trap was correct. Would Ashla follow the pattern—fall victim to the Green Sick, be exiled as a contamination, finally become what he was? He must know!
Why? Who? The questions still rode him. But more important—what was he to do now? Return to Iftcan to wait? Or . . .
In that moment Naill learned that one should never forget the forest was not all friend.
He plunged forward in a sprawl in the same instant that his nose was assaulted by a most stupefying charnel reek. Rolling, kicking, unable to free his right foot from a loop of dark ropy stuff, he hung at last head down and feet up against the wall of a pit, the stench from which turned him sick.
Kalcrok! Ayyar memory identified the enemy, the method of its attack. Naill twisted, trying to bring up his head and shoulders, the sword now free in his hand. He gained purchase with his elbow against the wall, enough to wrench his shoulders partly around. But he had only a second to bring out the sword point before the phosphorescent bulk on the other side of the hole moved.
The thing came in a flying leap meant to plaster it against the earth of the wall with the dangling body of its prey flattened under it. The very force of that spring brought its belly down upon the sword Naill held.
He cried out as claws scissored at his legs, as the terrible odor of that body, the disgusting weight of its mass struck against him. Then, as he hung gasping and choking, there came a thin screech, so high in the scale of sound as to cause a sharp pain in his head, and the kalcrok fell away, kicking and scrambling in the noisome depths of its trap, taking his sword, still in the deep belly wound, with it.
Naill, very close to unconsciousness, dangled head down once more. Then Ayyar memory prodded him to weak effort. To hang so was to die, even if the kalcrok had also suffered a death blow. He must try to move.
There was a bleeding rake across one arm; his legs were torn, too. But he must get free—he must! He twisted and turned, rubbing his body against the wall.
Perhaps the force of the kalcrok's spring had already weakened the web cord that held him, or perhaps his own feeble efforts fretted it thin against the rough wall. But it gave and he slid down into the debris at the pit bottom.
The gleaming lump that was the terror of that trap lay on its back, its clawed legs still jerking, the sword hilt projecting from its underparts. Naill retched, somehow got to his feet, and stumbled over to drag his defiled blade free. He ran it into the soil of the pit wall to clean it and looked about him half dazed.
To climb those walls was, he believed, close to impossible. They had been most skillfully fashioned to prevent the escape of the trapped. But kalcroks had back doors—they did not depend altogether on their pit traps to supply their food needs.
Only—such an exit would lead past the kalcrok's nest, and past any nestlings such a shelter might contain. Ayyar memory was clear enough to make Naill shudder. Move now—at once—before there was any stir there . . . if there were any to stir! He edged around the confines of the hole, supporting himself with a hand against the wall. The pain of his leg wounds was beginning to bite now. He must go, before those wounds could stiffen and keep him from moving at all.
This was it—a hole into blackness, from which issued a fetid odor to make him sick again. Forcing down his fear and repulsion, Naill went to his hands and knees, his sword ready, and crawled into that passage.
The walls were slick with slime, well polished by the kalcrok's constant use. This was an old, well-established den; all the more reason to fear a nest! And here the dark was such that his night sight, good as it was, could not help him. Scent? How could one separate any one evil odor from the general stench of this devil run? Hearing? He must depend now upon his ears for any warning.
And to do that he must go slowly.
So he crept onward, sweeping the sword back and forth ahead, to assure himself that there was no opening on either side of the run, pausing to listen. A scrape of leg against earth, the moving of a body—would he be able to recognize that for what it was, the warning of a nearby and occupied nest?
Sword point met nothingness to his left. Naill stiffened, listening. Nothing—nothing at all. Were the infant monsters alert and waiting to make their pounce? Or were there any nestlings now? Naill dared not linger too long.
It was the hardest test he had ever placed upon his courage and will, that slow forward creep. His only defense against attack, the sword, he kept point out, aimed at the opening he could not see, behind which lay death, not sudden, but very terrible.
The sword point bit at wall again—he had reached the other side of that opening. Now—now he must go forward with his back to that, never knowing when attack might come. This was an endless nightmare such as he had once awakened from in the past, shaking, wet with terror sweat.
On—on—no sounds . . . no, no sounds from behind. An empty nest—but he still could not be sure of that or count on such fortune. Relief could make one careless. Be ready, listen—creep—though how he could turn to fight in this narrow passage Naill did not know.
Then, abruptly, the surface under him angled sharply upward and he drew a breath deeper than a gasp. This was the exit! Up—up and out! He dug the sword into the earth, used it to lever himself out . . . to be met with rain full in his face, cold and slashing on his body. And not too far away he heard the torrent of the river. The river—and beyond: Iftcan!
Did Ayyar take over wholly then? Naill afterward thought so. It was as it had been when the fever held him—small broken snatches of dream action wrapping him round. Or were they real, those times when he clung to river-washed rocks while a swollen stream rose about him, when he staggered on through gusts of beating rain with lightning flashes showing him the towering dead of the tree city?
There was one crash of thunder, blast of lightning bolt so great, so dazzling, that together they blacked out the world. And from then on he had no memories at all.
Trees—Iftsiga! He lay looking up into the might of the ancient citadel, its silver-green crown so far above him that the leaves were only a haze of color against the sky—as high as the stars almost.
The Larsh! Naill sat up, reaching for his sword, looking about him for some sign of the enemy. His body hurt—battle wounds. He had survived, then, the overrun at the Second Ring.
"Jagna! Midar!" His call issued from his lips a weak whisper.
A swish of displaced air overhead. He held his sword ready. Wide white wings, which clapped to body as talons touched earth—a quarrin came to him, a pouch dangling from its beak. "Hoorurr!" Naill loosened his grip on the weapon hilt. Once more he blinked awake from a dream Ayyar had known. "Hoorurr!"
The bird dropped the pouch by his hand, snapped and chittered a reply. Then the quarrin walked slowly down the length of the man's body as if inspecting his clotted wounds. Naill was back—in the safety of Iftcan—though he did not remember anything since he had crawled out of the kalcrok's den.