THE MASTER KEY

Once upon a time there was a king who set himself above

the foreign merchants. What he did is of no account now;

it was long ago and on another planet, and besides, the

wench is dead. Harry Stenvik and I hung him by the seat

of his trousers from his tallest minaret, in sight of all the

people, and the name of the Polesotechnic League was

great in the land. Then we made inroads on the stock-in-

trade of the Solar Spice & Liquors Company factor and

swore undying brotherhood.

Now there are those who maintain that Nicholas van

Rijn has a cryogenic computer in that space used by the

ordinary Terran for storing his heart. This may be so.

But he does not forget a good workman. And I know no

reason why he should have invited me to dinner except

that Harry would be there, and-this being the briefest

of business trips to Earth for me-we would probably

have no other chance of meeting.

The flitter set me off atop the Winged Cross, where Van

Rijn keeps what he honestly believes is a modest little

penthouse apartment. A summer's dusk softened the mass

of lesser buildings that stretched to the horizon and be-

yond; Venus had wakened in the west and Chicago Inte-

grate was opening multitudinous lights. This high up, only

a low machine throb reached my ears. I walked along

roses and jasmine to the door. When it scanned me and

dilated, Harry was waiting. We fell into each other's arms

and praised God with many loud violations of His third

commandment.

Afterward we stood apart and looked. "You haven't

changed much," he lied. "Mean and ugly as ever. Methane

in the air must agree with you."

"Ammonia, where I've been of late," I corrected him.

"S.O.P.: occassional bullets and endless dickering. You're

disgustingly sleek and contented. How's Sigrid?" As it must

to all men, domesticity had come to him. In his case it

lasted, and he had built a house on the cliffs above Har-

danger Fjord and raised, mastiffs and sons. Myself-but

that also is irrelevant.

"Fine. She sends her love and a box of her own cookies.

Next time you .must wangle a longer stay and come see

us."

"The boys?"

"Same." The soft Norse accent roughened the least bit.

"Per's had his troubles, but they are mending. He's here

tonight

"Well, great." The last I'd heard of Harry's oldest son,

he was an apprentice aboard one of Van Rijn's ships,

somewhere in the Hercules region. But that was several

years ago, and you can rise fast in the League if you sur-

vive. "I imagine he has master's rank by now."

"Yes, quite newly. Plus an artificial femur and a story

to tell. Come, let's join them."

Hm, I thought, so Old Nick was economizing on his

bird-killing stones again. He had enough anecdotes of his

own that he didn't need to collect them, unless they had

some special use to him. A gesture of kindness might as

well be thrown into the interview.

We passed through the foyer and crossed a few light-

years of trollcat rug to the far end of the living room.

Three men sat by the viewer wall, at the moment trans-

parent to sky and city. Only one of them rose. He had been

seated a little to one side, in a tigery kind of relaxed alert-

ness-a stranger to me, dark and lean, with a blaster that

had seen considerable service at his hip.

Nicholas van Rijn wallowed his bulk deeper into his

lounger, hoisted a beer stein and roared, "Ha! Welcome

to you, Captain, and you will maybe have a small drink

like me before dinner?" After which he tugged his goatee

and muttered, "Gabriel will tootle before I get you bepes-

tered Anglic through this poor old noggin. I think I have

just called myself a small drink."

I bowed to him as is fitting to a merchant prince,

turned, and gave Per Stenvik my hand. "Excuse my stay-

ing put," he said. His face was still pale and gaunt; health

was coming back, but youth never would. "I got a trifle

clobbered."

"So ,I heard," I answered. "Don't worry, it'll heal up. I

hate to think how much of me is replacement by now, but

as long as the important parts are left. . ."

"Oh, yes, I'll be okay. Thanks to Manuel. Vb, Manuel

Felipe Gomez y Palomares of Nuevo Mexico. My ensign."

I introduced myself with great formality, according to

what I knew of customs of those poor and haughty colo-

nists from the far side of Arcturus. His courtesy was equal,

before he turned to make sure the blanket was secure

around Per's legs. Nor did he go back to his seat and his

glass of claret before Harry and I lowered ourselves. A

human servant-male, in this one Van Rijn establishment

-brought us our orders, akvavit for Harry and a martini

for me. Per fiddled with a glass of Ansan vermouth.

"How long will you be home?" I asked him after the

small talk had gone by.

"As long as needful," Harry said quickly.

"No more, though," Van Rijn said with equal speed.

"Not one millimoment more can he loaf than nature must

have; and he is young and strong."

"Pardon, senor," Manuel said-how softly and deferen-

tially, and with what a clang of colliding stares. "I would

not gainsay my superiors. But my duty is to know how it

is with my captain, and the doctors are fools. He shall rest

not less than till the Day of the Dead; and then surely,

with the Nativity so near, the sefior will not deny him the

holidays at home?"

Van Rijn threw up his hands. "Everyone, they call me

apocalyptic beast," he wailed, "and I am only a poor

lonely old man in a sea of grievances, trying so hard to

keep awash. One good boy with promises I find, I watch

him from before his pants dry out for I know his breed.

I give him costly schooling in hopes he does not turn

out another curdlebrain, and no sooner does he not but he

is in the locker and my fine new planet gets thrown to the

wolves!""

"Lord help the wolves," Per grimied. "Don't worry, sir,

I'm as anxious to get back as you are."

"Hoy, hoy, I am not going. I am too old and fat. Ah,

you think you have troubles now, but wait till time has

gnawed you oown to a poor old wheezer like me who has

not even any pleasures left. Abdul! Abdul, you jellylegs,

bring drink, you want we should dry up and puff away?

. . . What, only me ready for a refill?"

"Do you really want to see that Helheim -again?" Harry

asked, with a stiff glance at Van Rijn.

"Judas, yes," Per said. "It's just waiting for the right

man. A whole world, Dad! Don't you remember?"

Harry looked through the wall and nodded. I made haste

to intrude on his silence. "What were you there after, Per?"

"Everything," the young m?D said. "I told you it's an

entire planet. Not one percent of the land surface has been

mapped."

"Huh? Not even from orbit?"

Manuel's expression showed me what they thought of

orbital maps.

"But for a starter, what attracted us in the first place,

furs and herbs," Per said. Wordlessly, Manuel took a little

box from his pocket, opened it, and handed it to me. A

bluish-green powder of leaves lay within. I tasted. There

was a sweet-sour flavor with wild overtones, and the odor

went to the oldest, deepest part of my brain and roused

memories I had not known were lost.

"The chemicals we have not yet understood and synthe-

sized," Van Rijn rumbled around the cigar he was light-

ing. "Bah! What do my chemists do all day but play happy

fun games in the lab alcohol? And the furs, ja, I have Lu-

pescu of the Peltery volcanomaking that he must buy

them from me. He is even stooping to spies, him, he has

the ethics of a paranoid weasel. Fifteen thousand he spent

last month alone, trying to find where that planet is."

"How do you know how much he spent?" Harry asked

blandly.

Van Rijn managed to look smug and hurt at the same

time.

Per said with care, "I'd better not mention the coordi-

nates myself. It's out Pegasus way. A G-nine dwarf star,

about half as luminous as Sol. Eight planets, one of them

terrestroid. Brander came upon it in the course of a sur-

vey, thought it looked interesting, and settled down to

learn more. He'd really only time to tape the language

of the locality where he was camped, and do the basic-

basic planetography and bionics. But he did find out about

the furs and herbs. So I was sent to establish a trading

post.

"His first command," Harry said, unnecessarily on any-

one's account but his own.

"Trouble with the natives, eh?" I asked.

"Trouble is not the word," Van Rijn said. "The word is

not for polite ears." He dove into his beer stein and came

up snorting. "After all I have done for them, the saints

keep on booting me in the soul like this."

"But we seem to have it licked," Per said.

"Ah. You think so?" Van Rijn waggled a hairy fore-

finger at him. "That is what we should like to be more

sure of, boy, before we send out and maybe lose some

expensive ships."

"Y algunos hombres buenos," Manuel muttered, so low

he could scarcely be heard. One hand dropped to the butt

of his gun.

"I have been re.ading the reports from Brander's pea-

pIe," Van Rijn said. "Also your own. I think maybe I see a

pattern. When you have been swindling on so many plan-

ets like me, new captain, you will have analogues at your

digits for much that is new. . . . Ah, pox and pity it is to

get jaded!" He puffed a smoke ring that settled around

Per's bright locks. "Still, you are never sure. I think some-

times God likes a little practical joke on us poor mortals,

when we get too cockish. So I jump on no conclusions be-

fore I have heard from your own teeth how it was. Reports,

even on visitape, they have no more flavor than what my

competition sells. In you I live again the fighting and mer-

rylarks, everything that is now so far behind me in my

doting."

This from the single-handed conqueror of Borthu, Dio-

medes, and t'Kela!

"Well-" Per blushed and fumbled with his glass.

"There really isn't a lot to tell, you know. I mean, each of

you freemen has been through so much more than-uh-

one silly episode. . ."

Harry gestured at the blanketed legs. "Nothing silly--

there," he said.

Per's lips tightened. "I'm sorry. You're right. Men

died."

Chiefly because it is not good to dwell overly long on

those lost from a command of one's own, I said, "What's

the planet like? 'Terrestroid' is a joke. They sit in an

Earthside office and call it that if you can breathe the air."

"And not fall flat in an oof from the gravity for at least

half an hour, and not hope the whole year round you

have no brass-monkey ancestors." Van Rijn's nod sent

the black ringlets swirling around his shoulder.

"I generally got assigned to places where the brass mon-

keys melted," Harry complained.

"Well, Cain isn't too bad in the low latitudes," Per said.

His face relaxed, .and his hands came alive in quick ges-

tures that reminded me of his mother. "It's about Earth-

size, ayerage orbital radius a little over one A.V. Denser

atmosphere, though, by around fifteen percent, which

makes for more greenhouse effect. Twenty-hour rotation

period; no moons. Thirty-two degrees of axial tilt, which

does rather complicate the seasons. But we were at fif-

teen-forty north, in fairly low hills, and it was summer.

A nearby pool was frozen every morning, and snowbanks

remained on the slopes-but really, not bad for the planet

of a G-nine star."

"Did Brander name it Cain?" I asked.

"Yes. I don't know why. But it turned out appropriate.

Too damned appropriate." Again the bleakness. Manuel

took his captain's empty glass and glided off, to return in

a moment with it filled. Per drank hurriedly.

"Always there is trouble," Van Rijn said. "You will

learn."

"But the mission was going so well!" Per protested.

"Even the language and the data seemed to . . . to flow

into my head on the voyage out. In fact, the whole crew

learned easily." He turned to me. "There were twenty of us

on the Miriam Knight. She's a real beauty, Cheland-class

transport, built for speed rather than capacity, you know.

More wasn't needed, when we were only supposed to erect

the first post and get the idea of regular trade across to

the autochthones. We had the usual line of goods, fabrics,

tools, weapons, household stuff like scissors and meat

grinders. Not much ornament, because Brander's xenolo-

gists hadn't been able to work out any consistent pattern

for it. Individual Cainites seemed to dress and decorate

themselves any way they pleased. In the Ulash area, at

least, which of course was the only one we had any details

on."

"And damn few there," Harry murmured. "Also as

usual."

"Agriculture?" I inquired.

"Some primitive cultivation," Per said. "Small plots

scratched out of the forest, tended by the Lugals. In Ulash

a little metallurgy has begun, copper, gold, silver, but

even they are essentially neolithic. And essentially hunters

-the Yildivans, that is-along with such Lugals as they

employ to help. The food supply is mainly game. In fact,

the better part of what farming is done is to supply fab-

ric."

"What do they look like, these people?"

"I've a picture here." Per reached in his tunic and

handed me a photograph. "That's old Shivaru. Early in

our acquaintance. He was probably scared of the camera

but damned if he'd admit it. You'll notice the Lugal he

has with him is frankly in a blue funk."

I studied the image with an interest that grew. The back-

ground was harsh plut.:Jnic hillside, where grass of a

pale yellowish turquoise grew between dark boulders. But

on the right I glimpsed a densely wooded valley. The

sky overhead was wan, and the orange sunlight distorted

colors.

Shivaru stood very straight and stiff, glaring into the

lens. He was about two meters tall, Per said, his body build

much like that of a long-legged, deep-chested man.

Tawny, spotted fur covered him to the end of an elegant

tail. The head was less anthropoid: a black ruff on top,

slit-pupiled green eyes, round mobile ears, flat nose that

looked feline even to the cilia around it, full-lipped

mouth with protruding tushes at the comers, and jaw

that tapered down to a V. He wore a sort of loincloth,

gaudily dyed, and a necklace of raw semiprecious stones.

His left hand clutched an obsidian-bladed battle-ax and

there was a steel trade-knife in his belt.

"They're mammals, more or less," Per said, "though

with any number of differences in anatomy and chemis-

try, as you'd expect They don't sweat, however. There's a

complicated system of exo- and endothermic reactions in

the blood to regulate temperature."

"Sweating is not so common on cold terrestroids," Van

Rijn remarked. "Always you find analogs to something

you met before, if you look long enough. Evolution makes

parallels. "

"And skew lines," I added. "Ub-Brander got some

corpses to dissect, then?"

"Well, not any Yildivans," Per said. "But they sold him

as many dead Lugals as he asked for, who're obviously of

the same genus." He winced. "I hope to hell they didn't

kill the Lugals especially for that purpose."

My attention had gone to the creature that cowered be-

hind Shivaru. It was a squat, short-shanked, brown-furred

version of the other Cainite. Forehead and chin were

poorly developed and the muzzle had not yet become a

nose. The being was nude except for a heavy pack, a

quiver of arrows, a bow, and two spears piled on its mus-

cular back. I could see that the skin was rubbed naked

and callo~sed by such burdens. "This is a Lugal?" I

pointed.

"Yes. You see, there are two related species on the

planet, one farther along in evolution than the other. As if

Australopithecus had survived till today on Earth. The

Yildivans have made slaves of the Lugals--certainly in

mash, and as far as we could find out by spot checks,

everywhere on Cain."

"Pretty roughly treated, aren't they, the poor devils?"

Harry said. "J wouldn't trust a slave with weapons."

"But Lugals are completely trustworthy," Per said.

"Like dogs. They do the hard, monotonous work. The

Yildivans-male and female-are the hunters, artists, ma-

gicians, everything that matters. That is, what culture

exists is Yildivan." He scowled into his drink. "Though

I'm not sure how meaningful 'culture' is in this connec-

tion."

"How so?" Van Rijn lifted brows far above his small

black eyes.

"Well. . . they, the Yildivans, haven't anything like a

nation, a tribe, any sort of community. Family groups

split up when the cubs are old enough to fend for them-

selves. A young male establishes himself somewhere,

chases off all comers, and eventually one or more young

females come join him. Their Lugals tag along, naturally

-like dogs again. As near as I could learn, such families

have only the most casual contact. Occasional barter, oc-

casional temporary gangs formed to hunt extra-large ani-

mals, occasional clashes between individuals, and that's

about it."

"But hold on," I objected. "Intelligent races need more.

Something to be the carrier of tradition, something to

stimulate the evolution of brain, a way for individuals to

communicate ideas to each other. Else intelligence hasn't

got any biological function." ,

"I fretted over that too," Per said. "Had long talks with

Shivaru, Fereghir, and others who drifted into camp when-

ever they felt like it. We really tried hard to understand

each other. They were as curious about us as we about

them, and as quick to see the mutual advantage in trade

relations. But what a job! A whole different planet-two or

three billion years of separate evolution-and we had only

pidgin Ulash to start with, the limited vocabulary Bran-

der's people had gotten. We couldn't go far into the sub-

tleties. Especially when they, of course, took everything

about their own way of life for granted.

"Toward the end, though, I began to get a glimmering.

It turns out that in spite of their oafish appearance, the

Lugals are not stupid. Maybe even as bright as their mas-

ters, in a different fashion; at any rate, not too far behind

them. And--:-in each of these family groups, these patriar-

chal settlements in a cave or hut, way off in the forest,

there are several times as many Lugals as Yildivans. Every

member of the family, even the kids, has a number of

slaves. Thus you may not get Yildivan clans or tribes, but

you do get the numerical equivalent among the Lugals.

"Then the Lugals are sent on errands to other Yildivan

preserves, with messages or barter goods or whatever, and

bring back news. And they get traded around; the Yildi-

vans breed them deliberately, with a shrewd practical grasp

of genetics. Apparently, too, the Lugals are often allowed

to wander off by themselves when there's no work for

them to do--much as we let our dogs run loose--and hold

powwows of their own.

"You mustn't think of them as being mistreated. They

are, by our standards, but Cain is a brutal place and Yil-

divans don't exactly have an easy life either. An intelligent

Lugal is valued. He's made straw boss over the others,

teaches the Yildivan young special skills and songs and

such, is sometimes even asked by his owner what he

thinks ought to be done in a given situation. Some families

let him eat and sleep in their own dwelling, I'm told. And

remember, his loyalty is strictly to the masters. What

they may do to other Lugals is nothing to him. He'll

gladly help cull the we1iklings, punish the lazy, anything.

"So, to get to the point, I think that's your answer. The

Yildivans do have a community life, a larger society-but

indirectly, through their Lugals. The Yildivans are the

creators and innovators, the Lugals the communicators

and preservers. I daresay the relationship has existed for

so long a time that the biological evolution of both species

has been conditioned by it."

"You speak rather well of them," said Harry grimly,

"considering what they did to you."

"But they were very decent people at first." I could

hear in Per's voice how hurt he was by that which had

happened. "Proud as Satan, callous, but not cruel. Honest

and generous. They brought gifts whenever they arrived,

with no thought of payment. Two or three offered to assign

us Lugal laborers. That wasn't necessary or feasible when

we had machinery along, but they didn't realize it then.

When they did, they were quick to grasp the idea, and

mightily impressed. I think. Hard to tell, beCause they

couldn't or wouldn't admit anyone else might be superior

to them. That is, each individual thought of himself as

being as good as anyone else anywhere in the world. But

they seemed to regard us as their equals. I didn't try to

explain where we were really from. 'Another country'

looked sufficient for practical purposes.

"Shivaru was especially interested in us. He was mid-

dle-aged, most of his children grown and moved away.

Wealthy in local terms, progressive--he was experimenting

with ranching as a supplement to hunting-and his advice

was much sought after by the others. I took him for a ride

in a flitter and he was happy and excited as any child;

brought his three mates along next time so they could en-

joy it too. We went hunting together occasionally. Lord,

you should have seen him run down those great homed

beasts, leap on their backs, and brain them with one blow

of that tremendous ax! Then his Lugals would butcher

the game and carry it home to camp. The meat tasted

damn good, believe me. Cainite biochemistry lacks some

of our vitamins, but otherwise a human can get along all

right there.

"Mainly, though, I remember how we'd talk. I suppose

it's old hat to you freemen, but I had never before spent

hour after hour with another being, both of us at work

trying to build up a vocabulary and an understanding,

both getting such a charge out of it that we'd forget even

to eat until Manuel or Cherkez.-that was his chief Lugal,

a gnarly, droll old fellow, made me think of the

friendly gnomes in my fairy tale books when I was a

youngster-until one of them would tell us. Sometimes my

mind wandered off and I'd come back to earth realizing

that I'd just sat there admiring his beauty. Yildivans are

as graceful as cats, as pleasing in shape as a good gun. And

as deadly, when they want to be. I found that out!

"We had a favorite spot, in the lee of a cottage-sized

boulder on the hillside above camp. The rock was warm

against our backs; seemed even more so when I looked at

that pale shrunken sun and my breath smoking out white

across the purplish sky. Far, far overhead a bird of prey

would wheel, then suddenly stoop-in the thick air I could

hear the whistle through ifs wing feathers-and vanish

into the treetops down in the valley. Those leaves had a

million diflerept shades of color, like an endless autumn.

"Shivaru squatted with his tail curled around his knees,

ax on the ground beside him. Cherkez and one or two

other Lugals hunkered at a respectful distance. Their eyes

never left their Yildivan. Sometimes Manuel joined us,

when he wasn't busy bossing some phase of construction.

Remember, Manuel? You really shouldn't have kept so

quiet."

"Silence was fitting, Captain," said the Nuevo Mexican.

"Well," Per said, "Shivaru's deep voice would go on and

on. He was full of plans for the future. No question of a

trade treaty-no organization for us to make a treaty with

-but he foresaw his people bringing us what we wanted in

exchange for what we offered. And he was bright enough

to see how the existence of a central mart like this, a com-

mon meeting ground, would affect them. More joint under-

takings would be started. The idea of close cooperation

would take root. He looked forward to that, within the

rather narrow limits he could conceive. For instance, many

Yildivans working together could take real advantage of

the annual spawning run up the Mukushyat River. Big

canoes could venture across a strait he knew of, to open

fresh hunting grounds. That sort of thing.

"But then in a watchtick his ears would perk, his whis-

kers vibrate, he'd lean forward and start to ask about my

own people. What sort of country did we come from? How

was the game there? What were our mating and child-

rearing practices? How did we ever produce such beautiful

things? Oh, he had the whole cosmos to explore! Bit by

bit, as my vocabulary grew, his questions got less prac-

tical and more abstract. So did mine, naturally. We were

getting at each other's psychological foundations now, and

were equally fascinated.

"I was not too surprised to learn that his culture had no

religion. In fact, he was hard put to understand my ques-

tions about it. They practiced magic, but looked on it

simply as a kind of technology. There was no animism,

no equivalent of anthropomorphism. A Yildivan knew too

damn well he was superior to any plant or animal. I think,

but I'm not sure, that they had some vague concept of

reincarnation. But it didn't interest them much, appar-

ently, and the problem of origins hadn't occurred. Life was

what you had, here and now. The world was a set of phen-

omena, to live with or l;Ilaster or be defeated by as the

case might be.

"Shivaru asked me why I'd asked him about such a self-

evident thing."

Per shook his head. His glance went down to the blanket

around his lap and quickly back again. "That may have

been my first mistake. "

"No, Captain," said Manuel most gently. "How could

you know they lacked souls?"

"Do they?" Per mumbled.

"We leave that to the theologians," Van Rijn said.

"They get paid to decide. Go on, boy."

I could see Per brace himself. "I tried to explain the idea

of God," he said tonelessly, "I'm pretty sure I failed. Shi-

varu acted puzzled and . . . troubled. He left soon after.

The Yildivans of Ulash use drums for long-range com-

munication, have I mentioned? All that night I heard the

drums mutter in the valley and echo from the cliffs. We

had no visitors for a week. But Manuel, scouting around in

the area, said he'd found tracks' and traces. We were being

watched. -

"I was relieved, at first, when Shivaru returned. He had

a couple of others with him, Fereghir and Tulitur, impor-

tant males like himself. They came straight across the

hill toward me. I was supervising the final touches on our

timber-cutting system. We were to use local lumber for

most of our construction, you see. Cut and trim in the

woods with power beams, load the logs on a gravsled for

the sawmill, then snake them directly through the indura-

tion vats to the site, where the foundations had now been

laid. The air was full of whine and crash, boom ~d chug,

in a wind that cut like a laser. I could hardly see our

ship or our sealtents through dust, tinged bloody in the

sun.

"They came to me, those three tall hunters, with a dozen

armed Lugals hovering behind. Shivaru beckoned. 'Come,'

he said. 'This is no place for a Yildivan.' I looked him in

the eyes and they were filmed over, as if he'd put a glass

mask between me and himself. Frankly, my skin prickled.

I was unarmed--everybody was except Manuel, you know

what Nuevo Mexicans are.-,and I was afraid I'd precipi-

tate something by going for a weapon. In fact, I even

made a point of speaking Ulash as I ordered Tom Bullis to

take over for me and told Manuel to come along uphill.

If the autochthones had taken some notion into their

heads that we were planning harm, it wouldn't do for them

to hear us use a language they didn't know.

"Not another word was spoken till we were out of the

dust and racket, at the old place by the boulder. It

didn't feel warm tOday. Nothing did. 'I welcome you,' I

said to the Yildivans, 'and bid you dine and sleep with

us.' That's the polite formula when a visitor arrives. I

didn't get the regular answer.

"Tulitur hefted the spear he carried and asked-not

rudely, understand, but with a kind of shiver in the tone

-"Why have you come to Ulash?'

"Why?' I stuttered. 'You know. To trade.'

"No, wait, Tulitur,' Shivaru interrupted. 'Your ques-

tion is blind.' He turned to me. 'Were you sent?' he asked.

And what I would like to ask you sometime, freemen, is

whether it makes sense to call a voice black.

"I couldn't think of any way to hedge. Something had

gone awry, but I'd no feeblest notion what. A lie or a stall

was as likely, a priori, to make matters worse as the truth.

I saw the sunlight glisten along that dark ax head and felt

most infernally glad to have Manuel beside me. Even so,

the noise from the camp sounded faint and distant. Or was

it only that the wind was whittering louder?

"I made myself stare back at him. 'You know we are

here on behalf of others like us at home,' I said. The

muscles tightened still more under his fur. Also. . . I

can't read nonhuman expressions especially well. But Fer-

eghir's lips were drawn off his teeth as if he confronted an

enemy. Tulitur had grounded his spear, point down. Bran-

der's reports observed that a Yildivan never did that in

the presence of a friend. Shivaru, though, was hardest to

understand. I could have sworn he was grieved.

" !Did God send you?' he asked.

"That put the dunce's cap on the whole lunatic business.

I actually laughed, though I didn't feel at all funny. In-

side my head it went click-click-click. I recognized a se-

mantic point. Ulash draws some fine distinctions between

various kinds of imperative. A father's command to his

small child is entirely different-in word and concept both

-from a command to another Yildivan beaten in a fight,

which is different in turn from a command to a Lugal,

and so on through a wider range than our psycholinguists

have yet measured.

"Shivaru wanted to know if I was God's slave.

"Well, this was no time to explain the history of religion,

which I'm none too clear about anyway. I just said no, I

wasn't; God was a being in Whose existence some of us

believed, but not everyone, and He had certainly not

issued me any direct orders.

"That rocked them back! The breath hissed between

Shivaru's fangs, his ruff bristled aloft and'his tail whipped

his legs. 'Then who did send you?' he nearly screamed.

I could translate as well by: 'So who is your owner?'

"I heard a slither alongside me as Manuel loosened his

gun in the holster. Behind the three Yildivans, the Lugals

gripped their own axes and spears at the ready. You can

imagine how carefully I picked my words. 'We are here

freely,' I said, 'as part of an association.' Or maybe the

word I had to use means 'fellowship'-1 wasn't about to

explain economics either. 'In our home country,' I said,

none of us is a Lugal. You have seen our devices that

work for us. We have no need of Lugalhood.'

'Ah-h-h,' Fereghir sighed, and poised his spear. Man-

uel's gun clanked free. 'I think best you go,' he said to

them, 'before there is a fight. We do not wish to kill.'

"Brander had made a point of demonstrating guns, and

so had we. No one stirred for a time that went on eternally,

in that Fimbul wind. The hair stood straight on the Lugals.

They were ready to rush us and die at a word. But it

wasn't forthcoming. Finally the three Yildivans exchanged

glances. Shivaru said in a dead voice, 'Let us consider

this thing.' They turned on their heels and walked off

through the long, whispering grass, their pack close

around them.

"The drums beat for days and nights.

"We considered the thing ourselves at great length.

What was the matter, anyhow? The Yildivans were prim-

itive and unsophisticated by Commonwealth standards,

but not stupid. Shivaru had not been surprised at the ways

we differed from his people. For instance, the fact that we

lived in communities instead of isolated families had only

been one more oddity about us, intriguing rather than

shocking. And, as I've told you, while large-scale coopera-

tion among Yildivans wasn't common, it did happen once

m a while; so what was wrong with our doing likewise?

"Igor Yuschenkoff, the captain of the Miriam, had a

reasonable suggestion. 'If they have gotten the idea that

we are slaves, he said, 'then our masters must be still

more powerful. Can they think we are preparing a base

for invasion?'

But I told them plainly we are not slaves, I said.

No doubt.' He laid a finger alongside his nose. 'Do'

they believe you?' "'

"You can imagine how I tossed awake in my sealtent.

Should we haul gravs altogether, find a different area and

start afresh? That would mean scrapping nearly every-

thing we'd done. A whole Itew language to learn was the

least of the problems. Nor would a move necessarily help.

Scouting trips by flitter had indicated pretty strongly that

the same basic pattern of life prevailed everywhere on

Cain, as it did on Earth in the paleolithic era. If we'd run

afoul, not of some local taboo, but of some fundamental

. . . I just didn't know. I doubt if Manuel spent more

then two hours a night in bed. He was too busy tightening

our system of guards, drilling the men, prowling around to

inspect and keep them alert.

"But our next contact was peaceful enough on the sur-

face. One dawn a sentry roused me to say that a bunch of

natives were here. Fog had arisen overnight, turned the

world into wet gray smoke where you couldn't see three

meters. As I came outside I heard the drip off a trac parked

close by, the only clear sound in the muffiedness. Tulitur

and another Yildivan stood at the edge of camp, with

about fifty male Lugals behind. Their fur sheened with

water, and their weapons were rime-coated. They must

have traveled by night, Captain, Manuel said, for the

sake of cover. Surely others wait beyond view. He led a

squad with me.

"I made the Yildivans welcome, ritually, as if nothing

had happened. I didn't get any ritual back. Tulitur said

only, 'We are here to trade. For your goods we will retu~

those furs and plants you desire.

"That was rather jumping the gun, with our post still

less than half built. But I couldn't refuse what might be

an olive branch. 'That is well,' I said. 'Come, let us eat

while we talk about it.' Clever move, I thought. Accepting

someone's food puts you under the same sort of obliga-

tion in Ulash that it used to on Earth.

"Tulitur and his companion-Bokzahan, I remember the

name now-didn't offer thanks, but they did come into

the ship and sit at the mess table. I figured this would be

more ceremonious and impressive than a tent; also, it was

out of that damned raw cold. I ordered stuff like bacon

and eggs that the Cainites were known to like. They got

right to business. How much will you trade to us?

"That depends on what you want, and on what you

have to give in exchange, I said, to match their curtness.

"We have brought nothing with us, Bokzahan said,

for we knew not if you would be willing to bargain.

"Why should I not be? I answered. That is what I

came for. There is no strife between us. And I shot at him:

Is there?

"None of those ice-green eyes wavered. No, Tulitur

said, there is not. Accordingly, we wish to buy guns.

Such things we may not sell, I answered. Best not to

add that policy allowed us to as soon as we felt reasonably

sure no harm would result.'However, we have knives to

exchange, as well as many useful tools.

"They sulked a bit, but didn't argue. Instead, they went

right to work, haggling over terms. They w~ted as much

of everything as we'd part with, and really didri't try to

bargain the price down far. Only they wanted the stuff on

credit. They needed it now, they said, and it'd take time

to gather the goods for payment.

"That put me in an obvious pickle. On the one hand,

the Yildivans had always acted honorably and, as far as I

could check, always spoken truth. Nor did I want to an-

tagonize them. On the other hand-but Ľou can fill that in

for yourself. I flatter myself I gave them a diplomatic an-

swer. We did not for an instant doubt their good inten-

tions, I said. We knew the Yildivans were fine chaps. But

accidents could happen, and if so, we'd be out of pocket

by a galactic sum.

"Tulitur slapped the table and snorted, Such fears

might have been expected. Very well, we shall leave our

Lugals here until payment is complete. Their value is

great. But then you must carry the goods where we want

them.

"I decided that on those terms they could have half

the agreed amount right away."

Per fell silent and gnawed his lip. Harry leaned over to

pat his hand. Van Rijn growled, "Ja, by damn, no one can

foretell everything that goes wrong, only be sure that

some bloody-be-plastered thing will. You did hokay, boy.

. . . Abdul, more drink, you suppose maybe this is Mars?"

Per sighed. "We loaded the stuff on a gravsled," he went

on. "Manuel accompanied In an armed flitter, as a pre-

caution. But nothing happened. Fifty kilometers or so

from camp, the Yildivans told our men to land near a

river. They had canoes drawn onto the bank there, with a

few other Yildivans standing by. Clearly they intended to

float the goods further by themselves, and Manuel called

me to see if I had any objections. 'No,' I said. 'What differ-

ence does it make? They must want to keep the destina-

tion secret. They don't trust us any longer.' Behind him,

in the screen, I saw Bokzahan watching. Our communi-

cators had fascinated visitors before now. But this time,

was there some equivalent of a sneer on his face?

"I was busy arranging quarters and rations for the Lu-

gals, though. And a guard or two, nothing obtrusive. Not

that I really expected trouble. I'd heaTd their masters say,

Remain here and do as the Erziran direct until we come

for you. But nevertheless it felt queasy, having that pack

of dog-beings in camp.

"They settled down in their animal fashion. When the

drums began again that night they got restless, shifted

around in the pavilion we'd turned over to them and

mewled in a language Brander hadn't recorded. But they

were quite meek next morning. One of them even asked

if they couldn't help in our work. I had to laugh at the

thought of a Lugal behind the controls of a five hundred

kilowatt trac, and told him no, thanks, they need only

loaf and watch us. They were good at loafing.

"A few times, in the next three days, I tried to get them

into conversation. But nothing came of that. They'd an-

swer me, not in the deferential style they used to a Yildi-

van but not insolently either. However, the answers were

meaningless. Where do you live?' I would say. In the for-

est yonder, the slave replied, staring at his toes.What sort

of tasks do you have to do at home? That which my Yil-

divan sets for me. I gave up.

"Yet they weren't stupid. They had some sort of game

they played, involving figures drawn in the dirt, that I

never did unravel. Each sundown they formed ranks and

crooned, an eerie minor-key chant, with improvisations

that sometimes sent a chill along my nerves. Mostly they

slept, or sat and stared at nothing, but once in a while

several would squat in a circle, arms around their neigh-

bors shoulders, and whisper together.

"Well. . . I'm making the story too long. We were at-

tacked shortly before dawn of the fourth day.

"Afterward I learned that something like a hundred

male Yildivans were in that party, and heaven knows how

many Lugals. They'd rendezvoused from everywhere in

that tremendous territory called Ulash, called by the

drums and, probably, by messengers who'd run day and

night through the woods. Our pickets were known to their

scouts, and they laid a hurricane of arrows over those

spots, while the bulk of them rushed in between. Other-

wise I can't tell you much. I was a casualty." Per grimaced.

"What a damn fool thing to happen. On my first com-

mand!"

"Go on," Harry urged. "You haven't told me any de-

tails."

"There aren't many," Per shrugged. "The first screams

and roars slammed me awake. I threw on a jacket and

stuffed feet into boots while my free hand buckled on a gun

belt. By then the sirens were in full cry. Even so, I heard a

blaster beam sizzle past my tent.

"I stumbled out into the compound. Everything was one

black, boiling hell-kettle. Blasters flashed and flashed, si-

rens howled and voices cried battle. The cold stabbed at

me. Starlight sheened on snowbanks and hoarfrost over

the hills. I had an instant to think how bright and many

the stars were, out there and not giving a curse.

"Then Yuschenkoff switched on the ftoodlamps in the

Miriam's turret. Suddenly an aritficial sun stood overhead,

too bright for us to look at. What must it have been to the

Cainites? Blue-white incandescence, I suppose. They

swarmed among our tents and machines, tall leopard-

furred hunters, squat brown gnomes, axes, clubs, spears,

bows, slings, our own daggers in their hands. I saw only

one man-sprawled on the earth, gun still between his fin-

gers, head a broken horror.

"I put the command mike to my mouth-always wore it

on my wrist as per doctrine-and bawled out orders as I

pelted toward the ship. We had the atom itself to fight

for us, but we were twenty, no, nineteen or less, against'

Ulash.

"Now our dispositions were planned for defense. Two

men slept in the ship, the others in seal tents ringed around

her. The half dozen on guard duty had been cut off, but the

rest had the ship for an impregnable retreat. What we

must do, though, was rally to the rescue of those guards,

and quick. If it wasn't too late.

"I saw the boys emerge from their strong point under

the landing jacks. Even now I remember how Zerkow-

sky hadn't fastened his parka, and what a low-comedy

way it flapped around his bottom. He didn't use pajamas.

You notice the damnedest small things at such times,

don't you~ The Cainites had begun to mill about, dazzled

by the light. They hadn't expected that, or the siren, which

is a terrifying thing to hear at close range. Quite a few

of them were already strewn dead or dying.

"Then-but all I knew personally was a tide that bel-

lowed and yelped and clawed. It rolled over me from be-

hind. I went down under their legs. They pounded across

me and left me in the grip of a Lugal. He lay on my chest

and went for my throat with teeth and hands. Judas, but

that creature was strong! Centimeter by centimeter he

closed in against my pushing and gouging. Suddenly an-

other one got into the act. Must have snatched a club from

some fallen Cainite and attacked whatever part of me was

handiest, which happened to be my left shin. It's nothing

but pain and rage after that, till the blessed darkness came.

The fact was, of course, that our Lugal hostages had

overrun their guards and broken free. I might have ex-

Ipected as much. Even without specific orders, they

wouldn't have stood idle while their masters fought. But

doubtless they'd been given advance commands. Tulitur

and Bokzahan diddled us very nicely. First they got a big

consignment of our trade goods, free, and then they

planted reinforcements for themselves right in our com-

pound.

"Even so, the scheme didn't work. The Yildivans had'nt

really comprehended our power. How could they have?

Manuel himself dropped the two Lugals who were killing

me. He needed exactly two shots for that. Our boys swept

a ring of fire, and the enemy melted away.

"But they'd hurt us badly. When I came to, I was in the

Miriam's sick bay. Manuel hovered over me like an anx-

ious raven. How'd we do?' I think I said.

"You should rest, senor, he said, and God forgive me

that I made the doctor rouse you with drugs. But we must

have your decision quickly. Several men are wounded. Two

are dead. Three are missing. The enemy is back in the

wilderness, I believe with prisoners.

"He lifted me into a carrier and took me outside. I felt

no physical pain, but was lightheaded and half crazy. You

know how it is when you're filled to the cap with stimulol.

Manuel told me straight out that my legbone was pretty

well pulverized, but that didn't seem to matter at the

time. . . What do I mean, seem? Of course it didn't!

Gower and Muramoto were dead. Bullis, Cheng, and

Zerkowsky were gone.

"The camp was unnaturally quiet under the orange sun.

My men had policed the grounds while I was unconscious.

Enemy corpses were laid out in a row. Twenty-three Yildi-

vans-that number's going to haunt me for the rest of

my life-and I'm not sure how many Lugals, a hundred

perhaps. I had Manuel push me along while I peered into

face after still, bloody face. But I didn't recognize any.

"Our own prisoners were packed together in our main

basement excavation. A couple of hundred Lugals, but only

two wounded Yildivans. The rest who were hurt had been

carried off by their friends. With so much construction

and big machines standing around for cover, that hadn't

been too hard to do. Manuel explained that he'd stopped

the attack of the hostages with stunbeams. Much the best

weapon. You can't pre~ent a Lugal fighting for his master

with a mere threat to kill him.

"In a corner of the pit, glaring up at the armed men

above, were the Yildivans. One I didn't know. He had a

nasty blaster bum, and our medics had give nhim seda-

tion after patching it, so he was pretty much out of the

picture anyway. But I recognized the other, who was in-

tact. A stunbeam had taken him. It was Kochihir, an adult

son of Shivaru, who'd visited us like his father a time or

two.

"We stared at each other for a space, he and I. Finally,

I asked him. 'Why have you done this?' Each word

puffed white out of my mouth and the wind shredded it.

"Because they are traitors, murderers, and thieves by

nature, that's why, Yuschenkoff said, also in Ulash. Brand-

er's team had naturally been .careful to find out whether

there were. words corresponding to concepts of honor

and the reverse. I don't imagine the League will ever forget

the Darborian Semantics!

"Yuschenkoff spat at Kochihir. Now we shall hunt down

your breed like the animals they are, he said. Gower had

been his brother-in-law.

"No, I said at once, in Ulash, because such a growl

had risen from the Lugals that any insane thing might

have happened next. Speak thus no more. Yuschenkoff

shut his mouth, and a kind of ripple went among those

packed, hairy bodies, like wind dying out on ocean.

But Kochihir, I said, your father was my good friend. Or

so I believed. In what wise have we offended him and his

people?

"He raised his ruff, the tail lashed his ankles, and he

snarled, 'You must go and never come back. Else we shall

harry you in the forests, roll the hillsides down on you,

stampede horned beasts through your camps, poison the

wells, and bum the grass about your feet. Go, and do not

dare return!

"My own temper Bared-which made my head spin and

throb, as if with fever-and I said, We shall certainly not

go unless our captive friends are returned to us. There are

drums in camp that your father gave me before he

betrayed us. Call your folk on those, Kochihir, and tell

them to bring back our folk." After that, perhaps we can

talk. Never before.

"He fleered at me without replying.

"I beckoned to Manuel. 'No sense in stalling unneces-

sarily, I said. We'll organize a tight defense here. Won't

get taken by surprise twice. But we've got to rescue those

men. Send flitters aloft to search for them. The war party

can't have gone far.

"You can best tell how you argued with me, Manuel.

You said an airflit was an utter waste of energy which was

badly needed elsewhere. Didn't you?"

The Nuevo Mexican looked embarrassed. I did not wish

to contradict my captain," he said. His oddly delicate fin-

gers twisted together in his lap as he stared out into the

night that had fallen. "But, indeed, I thought that aerial

scouts would never find anyone in so many, many hectares

of hill and ravine, water and woods. They could have

dispersed; those devils. Surely, even if they traveled away

in company, they would not be in such a clump that infra-

red detectors could see them through the forest roof. Yet

I did not like to contridict my captain."

"Oh, you did, you," Per said. A comer of his mouth

bent upward. "I was quite daft by then. Shouted and

stormed at you, eh? Told you to jolly well obey orders and

get those flitters in motion. You saluted and started off,

and I called you back. You mustn't go in person. Too

damned valuable here. Yes, that meant I was keeping back

the one man with enough wilderness experience that he

might have stood a chance of identifying spoor, even

from above. But my brain was spinning down and down

the sides of a maelstrom. See what you can do to make

this furry bastard cooperate, I said."

"It pained me a little that my captain should appoint

me his torturer," Manuel confessed mildly. "Although

from time to time, on various planets, when there was

great need-No matter."

"I'd some notion of breaking down morale among our

prisoners,"Per said. "In retrospect, I see that it wouldn't

have made any difference if they had cooperated, at least

to the extent of drumming for us. The Cainites don't have

our kind of group solidarity. If Kochihir and his buddy

came to grief at our hands, that was their hard luck. But

Shivaru and some of the others had read our psychology

shrewdly enough to know what a hold on us their three

prisoners gave.

"I looked down at Kochihir: His teeth gleamed back. He

hadn't missed a syllable or a gesture, and even if he

didn't know any Anglic, he must have understood almost

exactly what was going on. By now I was slurring my

words as if drunk. So, also like a drunk, I picked them with

uncommon care. 'Kochihir,' I said, 'I have commanded

our fliers out to hunt down your people and fetch our own

whom they have captured. Can a Yildivan outrun a flying

ma-chine? Can he fight when its guns flame at him from

above? Can he hide from its eyes that see from end to end

to horizon? Your kinfolk will dearly pay if they do not

return our men of their own accord. Take the drums,

Kochihir, and tell them so. If you do not, it will cost you

dearly. I have commanded my man here to do whatever

may be needful to break your will.'

"Oh, that was a vicious speech. But Gower and Mura-

moto had been my friends. Bullis, Cheng, and Zerkowsky

still were, if they lived. And I was on the point of passing

out. I did, actually, on the way back to the ship. I heard

Doc Leblanc mutter something about how could he be ex-

pected to treat a patient whose system was abused with

enough drugs to bloat a camel, and then the words kind

of trailed off in a long gibber that went on and on, rising

and falling until I thought I'd been turned into an elec-

tron and was trapped in an oscilloscope. . . and the dark-

ness turned green and . . . and they tell me I was un-

conscious for fifty hours.

"From there on it's Manuel's story."

At this stage, Per was croaking. As he sank back in his

lounger, I saw how white he had become. One hand picked

at his blanket, and the vermouth slopped when he raised

his glass. Harry watched him, with a helpless anger that

smoldered at Van Rijn. The merchant said, "There, there,

so soon after his operation and I make him lecture us, ha?

But shortly comes dinner, no better medicine than a real

rijstaDel, and so soon after that he can walk about, he

comes to my place in Djakarta for a nice old-fashioned

orgy."

"Oh, hellfire!" Per exploded in a whisper. "Why're you

trying to make me feel good? I ruined the whole show!"

"Whoa, son, " I ventured to suggest. "You were in good

spirits half an hour ago, and half an hour from now

you'll be the same. It's only that reliving the bad moments

is more punishment than Jehovah would inflict. I've been

there too." Blindly, the blue gaze sought mine. "Look,

Per," I said, 'if Freeman Van Rijn thought you'd botched

a mission through your own fault, you wouldn't be lapping

his booze tonight. You'd be selling meat to the cannibals."

A ghost of a grin rewarded me.

"Well, Don Manuel," Van Rijn said, "now we hear from

you, nie?" ,

"By your favor, senor, I am no Don," the Nuevo Mexi-

can said, courteously, academically, and not the least hum-

bly. "My father was a huntsman in the Sierra de los Bos-

ques Secos, and I traveled in space as a mercenary with

Rogers' Rovers, becoming sergeant before I left them for

your service. No more." He hesitated. "Nor is there much

I can relate of the happenings on Cain."

"Don't make foolishness," Van Rijn said, finished his

third or fourth liter of beer since I arrived, and signaled

for more. My own glass had been kept filled too, so much

so that the stars and the city lights had begun to dance in

the dark outside. I stuffed my pipe to help me ease off. "I

have read the official reports from Your expeditioning,"

Van Rijn continued. "They are scum-dreary. I need de-

tails-the little things nobody thinks to record, like Per

bas used up his lawrence in telling-I need to make a

planet real for me before this cracked old pot of mine can

maybe find a pattern. For it is my experience of many other

planets, where I, even I, Nicholas van Rijn, got my nose

rubbed in the dirt-which, ho, hot takes a lot of dirt-it

is on that I draw. Evolutions have parallels, but also skews,

like somebody said tonight. Which lines is Cain's evolu-

tion parallel to? Talk, Ensign Gomezy Palomaro. Brag.

Pop jokes, sing songs, balance a chair on you! head if you

want-but talk!"

The brown man sat still a minute. His eyes were steady

on us, save when they moved to Per and back.

"As the senor wishes," he began. Throughout, his tone

was level, but the accent could not help singing.

"When they bore my captain away I stood in thought,

until Igor Yuschenko1I said, Well, who is to take the flit-

ters?

"None, I said.

"But we have orders, he said.

"The captain was hurt and shaken. We should not

have roused him, I answered, and asked of the men who

stood near, Is this not so?'

"They agreed, after small argument. I leaned over the

edge of the pit and asked Kochihir if he would beat the

drums for us. No, he said, whatever you do.

"I shall do nothing, yet, I said. We will bring you food

presently. And that was done. For the rest of the short

day I wandered about among the snows that lay in patches

on the grass. Ay, this was a stark land, where it swooped

down into the valley and then rose again at the end of

sight in saw-toothed purple ranges. I thought of home

and of one Dolores whom I had known, a long time ago.

The men did no work; they huddled over their weapons,

saying little, and toward evening the breath began to freeze

on their parka hoods.

"One by cne I spoke to them and chose them for those

tasks I had in mind. They were all good men of their

hands, but few had been hunters save in sport. I myself

could not trail the Cainites far, because they had crossed

a broad reach of naked rock on their way downward and

once in the forest had covered their tracks. But Hamud

ibn Rashid and Jacques Ngolo had been woodsmen in their

day. We prepared what we needed. Then I entered the

ship and looked on my captain-how still he lay!

"I ate lightly and slept briefly. Darkness had fallen when

I returned to the pit. The four men we had on guard stood

like deeper shadows against the stars which crowd that

sky. Go now, I said, and took out my own blaster. Their

footfalls crunched away.

"The shapes that clotted the blackness of the pit stirred

and mumbled. A voice hissed upward, Oh, you are back.

To torment me? Those Cainites have eyes that see in the

night like owls. I had thought, before, that they snickered

within tbemselves wben tbey watcbed us blunder about

after sunset.

"No, I said,I am only taking my turn to guard you.

"You alone? be scoffed.

"And this. I slapped. the blaster against my thigh.

"He fell silent. The cold gnawed deeper into me. I do

not think tbe Cainites felt it mucb. As the stars wbeeled

slowly overhead, I began to despair of my plan. Whispers

went among the captives, but otherwise I stood in a

world ",bere sound was frozen dead.

"When tbe thing happened, it went with devil's haste.

The Lugals bad been shifting about a while, as if restless.

Suddenly they were upon me. One had stood on anotber's

shoulders and leaped. To deatb, as tbey tbought-but my

sbot missed, a quick flare and an amazed gasp from him

that he was still alive. Had I not missed, several would

bave died to bring me down.

"As it was, two fell upon me. I went under, breaking

bands loose from my throat with a judo release but beld

writhing by their mass. Hard fists beat me on bead and

belly. A palm over my mouth muflIed my yells. Mean-

while the prisoners belped tbemselves out and fled.

"Finally I worked a leg free and gave one of them my

knee. He rolled off with pain rattling in his throat. I

twisted about on top of the otber and struck him below the

skull with the blade of my hand. When he went limp, I

sprang up and shouted.

"Siren and floodlights came to life. The men swarmed

from ship and tents. Back! I cried. Not into the dark!

Many Lugals had not yet escaped, and those retreated

snarling to the far side of the pit as our troop arrived.

With their bodies they covered the wounded Yildivan

from the guns. But we only fired, futilely, after those who

were gone from sight.

"Guards posted themselves around the cellar. I scrab-

bled over the earth, seeking my blaster. It was gone. Some-

one had snatched it up: if not Kochihir, then a Lugal who

would soon give it to him. Jacques Ngolo came to me and

saw. This is bad, he said.

"An evil turn of luck,' I admitted, but we must pro-

ceed anyhow. I rose and stripped off my parka. Below

were the helmet and spacesuit torso which had protected

me in the fight. I threw them down, for they would only

hinder me now, and put the parka back on. Hamud ibn

Rashid joined us. He had my pack and gear and another

blaster for me. I took them, and we three started our

pursuit.

"By the mercy of God, we had never found occasion to

demonstrate night-seeing goggles here. They made the

world clear, though with a sheen over it like dreams.

Ngolo's infrared tracker was our compass, the needle

trembling toward the mass of Cainites that loped ahead

of us. We saw them for a while, too, as they crossed the

bare hillside, in and out among tumbled boulders; but we

kept ourselves low lest they see us against the sky. The

grass was rough in my face when I went all-fours, and the

earth sucked heat out through boots and gloves. Some-

where a hunter beast screamed.

"We were panting by the time we reached the edge of

trees. Yet in under their shadows we must go, before the

Cainites fled farther than the compass would reach. Al-

ready it flickered, with so many dark trunks and so much

brake to screen off radiation. But thus far the enemy had

not stopped to hide his trail. I moved through the under-

brush more carefully than him-legs brought forward to

part the stems that my hands then guided to either side

of my body-reading the book of trampled bush and snap-

ped branch.

"After an hour we were well down in the valley. Tall

trees gloomed everywhere about; the sky was hidden, and

I must tune up the photomultiplier unit in my goggles.

Now the book began to close. The Cainites were moving

at a natural pace, confident of their escape, and even

without special effort they left little spoor. And since they

were now less frantic and more alert, we must follow so far

behind that infrared detection was of no further use.

"At last we came to a meadow, whose beaten grass

showed that they had paused here a while. And that was

seen which I feared. The party had broken into three or

four, each bound a different way. Which do we choose?

Ngolo asked.

"Three of us can follow three of them, I said.

"Bismillah! Hamud grunted. Blaster or no, I would

not care to face such a band alone. But what must be, must

be.

"We took so much time to ponder what clues the forest

gave that the east was gray before we parted. Plainly, the

Lugals had gone toward their masters' homes, while Ko-

chihir's own slaves had accompanied him. And Kochihir

was the one we desired. I could only guess that the largest

party was his, because most likely the first break had been

made under his orders by his own Lugals, whose capabili-

ties he knew. That path I chose for myself. Hamud and

Ngolo wanted it too, but I used my rank to seize the

honor, that folk on Nuevo Mexico might never say a Go-

mez lacked courage.

"So great a distance was now between that there was

no reason not to use our radios to talk with-each other and

with the men in camp. That was o~ten consoling, in the

long time which was upon me. For it was slow, slow,

tracing those woods-wily hunters through their own

land. 1 do not believe 1 could have done it, had they been

only Yildivans and such Lugals as are regularly used in

the chase. But plain to see, the attack had been strength-

ened by calling other Lugals from fields and mines and

household tasks, and those were less adept.

"Late in the morning, Ngolo called. My gang just

reached a cave and a set of lean-tos, he said. I sit in a

tree and watch them met by some female and half-grown

Yildivans. They shuffle off to their own shed. This is where

they belong, I suppose, and they are not going farther.

Shall I return to the meadow and pick up another trail?

"No, I said, it would be too .cold by now. Backtrack to

a spot out of view and have a flitter fetch you.

"Some hours later, the heart leaped in my breast. For I

came upon a tree charred by unmistakable blaster shots.

Kochihir had been practicing.

"I called Hamud and asked where he was. On the bank

of a river, he said, casting about the place where they

crossed. That was a bitter stream to wade!

"Go no farther, I said. My path is the right one.

Have yourself taken back to camp.

" What? he asked. 'Shall we not join you now?

" No, I said. It is uncertain how near I am to the end.

Perhaps so near that a flitter would be seen by them as it

came down and alarm them. Stand by. I confess it was

a lonely order to give.

"A few times I stopped to eat and rest. But stimulants

kept me going in a way that would have surprised my

quarry who despised me. By evening his trail was again so

fresh that I slacked my pace and went on with a snake's

caution. Down here, after sunset, the air was not so cold

as on the heights; yet every leaf glistened hoar in what

starlight pierced through.

"Not much into the night, my own infrared detector

began to register a source, stronger than living bodies

could account for. I whispered the news into my radio and

then ordered no more communication until further no-

tice, lest we be overheard. Onward I slipped. The forest

rustled and creaked about me, somewhere far off a heavy

animal broke brush in panic flight, wings whirred over-

head, yet Santa Maria, how silent and alone it was!

"Until I came to the edge of a smaIl clearing.

"A fire burned there, throwing unrestful shadows on

the wall of a big, windowless log cabin which nestled

under the trees beyond. Two Yildivans leaned on their

spears. And light glimmered from the smoke hole in the

roof.

"Most softly, I drew my stun gun. The bolt snicked

twice, and they fell in heaps. At once I sped across the

open ground, crouched in the shadow under that rough

wall, and waited.

"But no one had heard. I glided to the doorway. Only a

leather curtain blocked my view. I twitched it aside barely

enough that I might peer within.

"The view was dimmed by smoke, but I could see that

there was just one long room. It did not seem plain, so

beautiful were the furs hung and draped everywhere

about. A score or so of Yildivans, mostly grown males,

squatted in a circle around the fire, which burned in a pit

and picked their fierce flat countenances out of the dark.

Also there were several Lugals hunched in a comer. I

recognized old Cherkez among them, and was glad he had

outlived the battle. The Lugals in Kochihir's party must

have been sent to barracks. He himself was telling his

father Shivaru of his escape.

"As yet the time was unripe for happiness, but I vowed

to light many candIes for the saints. Because this was as I

had hoped: Kochihir had not gone to his own home, but

sought an agreed rendezvous. Zetkowsky, Cheng, and Bul-

lis were here. They sat in another comer at the far end of

the room, coughing from the smoke, skins drawn around

them to ward off the cold.

"Kochihir finished his account and looked at his father

for approval. Shivaru's tail switched back and forth.

Strange that they were so careless about you, he said.

" They are like blind cubs, Kochihir scoffed.

" I am not so sure, the old Yildivan murmured. Great

are their powers. And . . . we know what they did in the

past." Then suddenly he grew stiff, and his whisper struck

out like a knife. Or did they do it? Tell me again, Kochi-

hir, how the master ordered one thing and the rest did

another.

" No, now, that means nothing, said a different Yildi-

van, scarred and grizzled. What we must devise is a use

for these captives. You have thought they might trade our

Lugals and Gumush, whom Kochihir says they still hold,

for three of their own. But I say, Why should they? Let

us instead place the bodies where the Erziran can find

them, in such condition that they will be warned away.

" Just so, said Bokzahan, whom I now spied in the

gloom.'Tulitur and I proved they are weak and foolish.

" First we should try to bargain, said Shivaru. If thrlt

fails. . . His fangs gleamed in the firelight.

" Make an example of one, then, before we talk, Ko-

chihir said angrily. They threatened the same for me.

"A rumble went among them, as from a beast's cage in

the zoo. I thought with terror of what might be done. For

my captain has told you how no Yildivan is in authority

over any other. Whatever his wishes, Shivaru could not

stop them from doing what they would.

"I must decide my own course immediately. Blaster

bolts could not destroy them all fast enough to keep them

from hurling the weapons that lay to hand upon me-not

unless I set the beam so wide that our men must also be

killed. The stun gun was better, yet it would not over-

power them either before. I went down under axes and

clubs. By standing to one side I could pen them within, for

they had only the single door. But Bullis, Cheng, and Zer-

kowsky would remain hostages.

"What I did was doubtless stupid, for I am not my cap-

tain. I sneaked back to the edge of the woods and called

the men in camp. 'Come as fast. as may bE, I said, and left

the radio going for them to home on. Then I circled about

and found a tree overhanging the cabin. Up I went, and

down again from a branch to tfie sod roof, and so to the

smoke hole. Goggles protected my eyes, but nostrils with-

ered in the fumes that poured forth. I filled my lungs with

clean air and leaned forward to see.

"Best would have been if they had gone to bed. Then I

could have stunned them one by one as they slept, with-

out risk. But they continued to sit about and quarrel over

what to do with their captives. How hard those poor men

tried to be brave, as that dreadful snarling broke around

them, as slit eyes turned their way and hands went strok-

ing across knives!

"The time felt long, but I had not completed the Rosary

in my mind when thunder awoke. Our flitters came down

the sky like hawks. The Yildivans roared. Two or three

of them dashed out the door to see what was afoot. I

dropped them with my stunner, but not before one had

screamed, 'The Erzirall are here!'

"My face went back to the smoke hole. It was turmoil

below. Kochihir screeched and pulled out his blaster. I

fired but missed. Too many bodies in between, senores.

There is no other excuse for me.

"I took the gun in my teeth, seized the edge of the

smoke hole, and swung myself as best I could before let-

ting go. Thus I struck the dirt floor barely outside the

firepit, rolled over and bounced erect. Cherkez leaped for

my throat. I sent him reeling with a kick to the belly,

took my gun, and fired around me.

"Kochihir could not be seen in the mob which strug-

gled from wall to wall. I fought my way toward the prison-

ers. Shivaru's ax whistled down. By the grace of God, I

dodged it, twisted about and stunned him point-blank. I

squirmed between two others. A third got on my back.

I snapped my head against his mouth and felt flesh give

way. He let go. With my gun arm and my free hand I

tossed a Lugal aside and saw Kochihir. He had reached the

men. They shrank from him, too stupefied to fight. Hate

was on his face, in his whole body, as he took unpracticed

aim.

"He saw me at his sight's edge and spun. The blaster

crashed, blinding in that murk. But I had dropped to one

knee as I pulled trigger. The beam scorched my parka

hood. He toppled. I pounced, got the blaster, and whirled

to stand before our people.

"Bokzahan raised his ax and threw it. I blasted it in

mid air and then killed him. Otherwise I used the stunner.

And in a minute or two more, the matter was finished. A

grenade brought down the front wall of the cabin. The

Cainites fell before a barrage of knockout beams. We left

them to awaken and returned to camp."

Again silence grew upon us. Manuel asked if he might

smoke, politely declined Van Rijn's cigars, and took a

vicious-looking brown cigarette from his own case. That

was a lovely, grotesque thing, wrought in silver on some

planet I could not identify.

"Whoof!" Van Rijn gusted. "But this is not the

whole story, from what you have written. They came to

see you before you left."

Per nodded. "Yes, sir," he said. A measure of strength

had rearisen in him. "We'd about finished our preparations

when Shivaru himself arrived, with ten other Yildivans

and their Lugals. They walked slowly into the compound,

ruffs erect and tails held stiff, looking neither to right nor

left. I guess they wouldn't have been surprised to be shot

down. I ordered such of the boys as were covering them

to holster guns and went out on my carrier to say hello

with due formality.

"Shivaru responded just as gravely. Then he got almost

tongue-tied. He couldn't really apologize. Ulash doesn't

have the phrases for it. He beckoned to Cherkez. You were

good to release our people whom you held, he said." Per

chuckled. "Huh! What else were we supposed to do, keep

feeding them? Cherkez gave him a leather bag. I bring

a gift, he told me, and pulled out Tulitur's head. We

shall return as much of the goods he got from you as we

can find, he promised, 'and if you will give us time, we

shall bring double payment for everything else.

"I'm afraid that after so much blood had gone over the

dam, I didn't find the present as gruesome as I ought. I

only sputtered that we didn't require such tokens.

" But we do, he said, to cleanse our honor.

" I invited them to eat, but they declined. Shivaru made

haste to explain that they didn't feel right about accepting

our hospitality until their debt was paid off. I told

them we were pulling out. Though that was obvious from

the state of the camp, they still looked rather dismayed.

So I told them we, or others like us, would be back, but

first it was necessary to get our injured people home.

"Another mistake of mine. Because being reminded of

what they'd done to us upset them so badly that they only

mumbled when I tried to find out why they'd done it. I

decided best not press that issue--the situation being deli-

cate yet-and they left with relief branded on them.

"We should have stuck around a while, maybe, because

we've got to know what the trouble was before committing

more men and equipment to Cain. Else it's all too likely to

flare up afresh. But between our being shorthanded, and

having a couple of chaps who needed first-class medical

treatment, I didn't think we could linger. All the way

home we wondered and argued. What had gone wrong?

And what, later, had gone right? We still don't know."

Van Rijn's eyes glittered at him. "What is your theory?"

he demanded.

"Oh-" Per spread his hands. "Yuschenkoff's, more or

less. They were afraid we were the spearhead of an inva-

sion. When we acted reasonably decently-refraining from

mistreatment of prisoners, thanks to Manuel, and using

stunners rather than blasters in the rescue operation-they

decided they were mistaken."

Manuel had not shifted a muscle in face or body, as far

as I could see. But Van Rijn's battleship prow of a nose

swung toward him and the merchant laughed, "You have

maybe a little different notion, ha? Come, spew it out."

"My place is not to contradict my captain," said the

Nuevo Mexican.

"So why you make fumblydiddles against orders, that

day on Cain? When you know better, then you got a duty,

by damn, to tell us where to stuff our heads."

"If the senor commands. But I am no learned man. I

have no book knowledge of studies made on the psych on-

omy. It is only that. . . that I think I know those Yil-

divans. They seem not so unlike men of the barranca

country on my home world, and again among the Ro

vers."

"How so?"

"They live very near death, their whole lives. Courage

and skill in fighting, those are what they most need to sur-

vive, and so are what they most treasure. They thought,

seeing us use machines and weapons that kill from afar,

seeing us blinded by night and most of us clumsy in the

woods, hearing us talk about what our life is like at home

-they thought we lacked cojones. So they scorned us.

They owed us nothing, since we were spiritless and could

never understand their own spirit. We were only fit to be

the prey, first of their wits and then of their weapons."

Manuel's shoulders drew straight. His voice belled out so

that I jumped in my seat. "When they found how terrible.

men are, that they themselves are the weC\k ones, we

changed in their "eyes from peasants to kings!"

Van Rijn sucked noisily on his cigar. "Any other ship-

board notions?" he asked.

"No, sir, those were our two schools of thought," Per

said.

Van Rijn gaffawed. "So! Take comfort, freemen. No

need for angelometrics on pinheads. Relax and drink.

You are both wrong."

"I beg your pardon," Harry rapped. "You were not

there, may I say."

"No, not in the flesh." Van Rijn slapped his paunch.

"Too much flesh for that. But tonight I have been on Cain

up here, in this old brain, and it is rusty and afloat in al

chol but it has stored away more information about the

unjverse than maybe the universe gets credjt for holding.

I see now what the parallels are. Xanadu, Dunbar, Tam-

etha, Disaster Landing. . . oh, the analogue is never exact

and on Cain the thing I am thinking of has gone far and

far. . . but still I see the pattern, and what happened

makes sense.

"Not that we have got to have an analogue. You gave us

so many clues here that I could solve the puzzle by logic

alone. But analogues help, and also they show my conclu-

sion is not only correct but possible."

Van Rijn paused. He was so blatantly waiting to be

coaxed that Harry and 1 made a long performance out of

refreshing our drinks. Van Rijn turned purple, wheezed a

while, decided to keep his temper for a better occasion,

and chortled.

"Hokay, you win," he said. "I tell you short and fast,

because very soon we eat if the cook has not fallen in the

curry. Later you can study the formal psychologics.

"The key to this problem is the Lugals. You have been

calling them slaves, and there is your mistake. They are

not. They are domestic animals."

Per sat bolt upright. "Can't be!" he ~xclaimed. "Sir. I

mean, they have language and-"

"Ja, ja, ja. for all I care they do mattress algebra in

their heads. They are still tame animals. What is a slave,

anyhows? A man who has got to do what another man

says, willy-billy. Right? Harry said he would not trust a

slave with weapons, and 1 would not either, because his-

tory is too pocked up with slave revolts and slaves running

away and slaves dragging their feet and every such fool-

ishness. But your big fierce expensive-dogs, Harry, you

trust them with their teeth, nie? When your kids was

little and wet, you left them alone in rooms with a dog

to keep watches. There is the difference. A slave mayor

not obey. But a domestic animal has got to obey. His genes

won't let him do anything different.

"Well, you yourselves figured the Yildivans had kept

Lugals so long, breeding them for what traits they wanted,

that this had changed the Lugal nature. Must be so. Other-

wise the Lugals would be slaves, not animals, and could

not always be trusted the way you saw they were. You also

guessed the Yildivans themselves must have been affected,

and this is very sleek thinking only you did not carry it

so far you ought. Because everything you tell about the

Yildivans goes to prove by nature they are wild animals.

"I mean wild, like tigers and bufIalos. They have no

genes for obediences, except to their parents when they

are little. So long have they kept Lugals to do the dirty

work-before they really became intelligent, I bet, like ants

keeping aphids; for remember, you found no Lugals that

was not kept-any gregarious-making genes in the Yildi-

vans, any inborn will to be led, has gone foof. This must

be so. Otherwise, from normal variation in ability, some

form of Yildivan ranks would come to exist, nie?

"This pops your fear-of-invasion theory, Per Stenvik.

With no concept of a tribe or army, they can't have any

notions about conquest. And wild animals don't turn hum-

ble when they are beat, Manuel Gomez y Palomares, the

way you imagine. A man with a superiority complexion

may lick your boots when you prove you are his bet-

ter; but an untamed carnivore hasn't got any such pride

in the first place. He is plain and simple independent of

you.

"Well, then, what did actual go on in their heads?

"Recapitalize. Humans land and settle down to deal.

Yildivans have no experience of races outside their own

planet. They natural assume you think like them. In punc-

ture of fact, I believe they could not possible imagine any-

thing else, even if they was told. Your findings about their

culture structure shows their half-symbiosis with the Lu-

gals is psychological too; they are specialized in the

brains, not near so complicated as man.

"But as they get better acquaintanced, what do they

see? People taking orders. How can this be? No Yildivan

ever took orders, unless to save his life when an enemy

stood over him with a sharp thing. Ab, ha! So some of the

strangers is Lugal type. Pretty soon, I bet, old Shivaru de-

cides all of you is Lugal except young Stenvik, because in

the end all orders come from him. Some others, like

Manuel, is straw bosses maybe, but no more. Tame ani-

mals.

"And then Per mentions the idea of God."

Van Rijn crossed himself with a somewhat irritating

piety. "I make no b1asfuming," he said. "But everybody

knows our picture of God comes in part from our kings.

H you want to know how Oriental kings in ancient days

was spoken to, look in your prayer book. Even now, we

admit He is the Lord, and we is supposed to do His will,

hoping He will not take too serious a few things that hap-

pen to anybody like anger, pride, envy, gluttony, lust, sloth,

greed, and the rest what makes life fun.

"Per said this. So Per admitted he had a master. But

then he must also be a Lugal-an anima1. No Yildivan

could possible confess to having even a mythical master,

as shown by the fact they have no religion themselves

though their Lugals seem to.

"Give old boy Shivaru his credits, he came again with

some friends to ask further. What did he learn? He al-

ready knew everybody else was a Lugal, because of obey-

ing. Now Per said he was no better than the rest. This

confirmed Per was also a Lugal. And what blew the cork

out of the bottle was when Per said he nor none of them

had any owners at home!

"Whup, whup, slow down, youngster. You could not

have known. Always we make discoveries the hard way.

Like those poor Yildivans.

"They was real worried, you can imagine. Even dogs

turn on people now and then, and surely some Lugals go

bad once in a while on Cain and make big trouble before

they can get killed. The Yildivans had seen some of your

powers, knew you was dangerous. . . and your breed of

Lugal must have gone mad and killed off its own Yildi-

vans. How else could you be Lugals and yet have no mas-

ters?

"So. What would you and I do, friends, if we lived in

lonely country houses and a pack of wild dogs what had

killed people set up shop in our neighborhood?"

Van Rijn gurgled beer down his throat. We pondered for

a while. "Seems pretty farfetched," Harry said.

"No." Per's cheeks burned with excitement. "It fits.

Freeman Van Rijn put into words what I always felt as I

got to know Shivaru. A-a single-mindedness about him.

As if he was incapable of seeing certain things, grasping

certain ideas, though his reasoning faculties were intrin-

sically as good as mine. Yes. . ."

I nodded at my pipe, which had been with me when I

clashed against stranger beings than that.

"So two of them first took advantage of you," Van Rijn

said, "to swindle away what they could before the attack

because they wasn't sure the attack would work. No shame

there. You was outside the honor concept, being animals.

Animals whose ancestors must have murdered a whole

race of true humans, in their views. Then the alarmed

males tried to scrub you out. They failed, but hoped

maybe to use their prisoners for a lever to pry you off

their country. Only Manuel fooled them."

"But why'd they change their minds about us?" Per

asked.

Van Rijn wagged his finger. "Ra, there you was lucky.

You gave a very clear and important order. Your men dis-

obeyed every bit of it. Now Lugals might go crazy and kill

off Yildivans, but they are so bred to being bossed that

they can't stand long against a leader. Or if they do, it's

because they is too crazy to think straight. Manuel,

though, was thinking straight like a plumber line. His

strategy worked five-four-three-two-one-zero. Also, your

peop-le did not kill more Yildivans than was needful,

which crazy Lugals would do.

"So you could not be domestic animals after all, gone

bad or not. Therefore you had to be wild animals. The

Cainite mind-a narrow mind like you said-can't imagine

any third horn on that special bull. If you had proved you

was not Lugal type, you must b~ Yildivan type. Indica-

tions to the contrariwise, the way you seemed to take or-

ders or acknowledge a Lord, those must have been mis-

understandings on the Cainites' part.

"Once he had time to reason this out, Shivaru saw his

people had done yours dirty. Partway he felt bad about

it in his soul, if he has one stowed somewhere; Yildivans

do have some notion about upright behavior to other Yil-

divans. And besides, he did not want to lose a chance at

your fine trade goods. He convinced his friends. They

did what best they could think about to make amend-

ments."

Van Rijn rubbed his palms together in glee. "Oh, ho, ho,

what customers they will be for us!" he roared.

We sat still for another time, digesting the idea, until

the butler announced dinner. Manuel helped Per rise.

"We'll have to instruct everybody who goes to Cain," the

young man said. "I mean, not to let on that we aren't wild

animals, we humans."

"But, Captain," Manuel said, and his head lifted high,

"we are."

Van Rijn stopped and looked at us a while. Then he

shook his own head violently and shambled bearlike to

the viewer wall. "No," he growled. "Some of us are."

"How's that?" Harry wondered.

"We here in this room are wild," Van Rijn said. "We

do what we do because we want to or because it is right.

No other motivations, nie? .If you made slaves of us, you

would for sure not be wise to let us near a weapon.

"But how many slaves has there been, in Earth's long

history, that their masters could trust? Quite some! There

was even arnlies of slaves, like the Janissaries. And how

many people today is domestic animals at heart? Wanting

somebody else should tell them what to do, and take care

of their needfuls, and protect them not just against their

fellow men but against themselves? Why has every free

human society been so short-lived? Is this not because

the wild-animal men are born so heartbreaking seldom?"

He glared out across the ~ity, where it winked and glit-

tered beneath the stars, around the curve of the planet.

"Do you think they yonder is free?" he shouted. His hand

chopped downward in scorn.