Silent Songs (48 page)

It
can't all have been for nothing!
she thought.

"Tesa,
now!"
Javier demanded, but it was already too late. They'd been surrounded again by a large group of soldiers. This group had learned their lesson; they kept their distance, aiming heavy weapons. One of the soldiers signaled her to land. She stiffened, searching for an escape, but there was none. She signaled the cohort to disperse, but they hesitated.

Then Snowberry, whose family the Anurans had wiped out in Taller's territory, flew at the nearest soldier. Tesa screamed at him to stop, but he hit the Anuran hard, knocking him from his sled. The young male was

immediately struck by at least ten missiles from the other soldiers' weapons.

His brilliant crown dulled and he fell from the sky like a stone.

Tesa signaled the others wildly, shouting at them, and finally they obeyed her and left. Above them, the Aquila futilely fought the huge spaceships.

Tesa realized they'd gotten too far from their allies. They were cut off. She couldn't face losing Javier, too. There was nothing to do but surrender.

Bitterly damning her foolishness, Tesa raised her hands in capitulation and descended.

Even with the breathing mask, Jib could barely catch his breath as the Singers towed him into the Anuran colony. The closer they got to the site of their slaughter, the more anxious they grew. Still, they could sense the rest of their herd, and their eagerness to be reunited outweighed their fear.

Jib had redonned his nullifiers, but felt as if he could still "hear," since the Singers filtered the sound into his mind. The

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muffled roars of explosions, the sounds of buildings collapsing, were violent and scary. He had to keep reassuring himself that they would be okay, they would make it. If
he
panicked, there was no telling what would happen to the herd.

The young Maori watched as Tesa destroyed the force-field, and he was soon caught up in the herd's excitement as they remet their loved ones. The mental pull of the Singers was more than the Quakers could resist, and soon they were storming the place. Even from the River, Jib could see the mass destruction they caused, and the effect that devastation had on the enemy forces. He cheered and the Singers did, too.

He urged the herd east, to the sea, but the River was suddenly filled with charging Quakers. The herd was forced to split up to avoid them. Jib clung to Taniwha desperately.

When the ships appeared and began striking the Quakers down, the Singers grew more frightened. Nothing had ever been able to injure the great beasts, not even the Mate Kai. Jib tried to get them unified again, but the moment had been lost.

The water around them churned wildly, and Taniwha yanked Jib into a small side pool as the massive body of a drugged Quaker crashed down near them, trapping them in the tiny inlet. The young calf wailed for his mother and his panic pushed the herd to their limit. Jib tried to ease the youngster's fears, but soon his brain was flooded by his friend's terror. Unbidden, images of the Great Hunger filled his mind. Reptilian, as large as a Quaker, its enormous snout opened to reveal rows of bloodstained razor teeth. Jib could barely breathe, he was so frightened, and could no longer focus on what was real.

Drive it away,
Jib begged Taniwha. That's what his people had done so many centuries ago. He reached into his ... no ... Taniwha's racial memories.

He could see the being clearly, see how the herd projected their fear into it, driving it away until it starved. But
how
did they do it?

He opened his mind until he stopped being Jib and became a Singer, until he could feel his big, round body, his paddle tail, his strong flippers. Then he reached into his Singer's memories, and called up the beast again. This time he didn't shy from the image, but examined it. He saw his people die, saw their blood, smelled it in the water. And he felt their panic,
his
panic, felt them project it... into the tiny brain of the primitive creature that fed on them. A brain that was so simple, it could register only the basest emotions.

Jib was jerked out of his reverie by the ominous presence of

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an armed guard. Taniwha swam the length of their tiny enclosure wildly, towing the Maori. The guard fired at the helpless animal and a small projectile buried itself in Taniwha's side. Jib felt as if he'd been struck himself; he screamed as Taniwha's pain flooded through him. Shaking his head, he tried to ignore the horrible sensation and searched the calf's back until he found the missile. He yanked it free, fearing it might be filled with toxins, but that didn't diminish the youngster's pain.

Blinking water out of his eyes, desperate to do
something,
Jib stared at the guard who was aiming again at the young Singer. He fixed the Anuran's image in his tortured mind, and slowly turned it into the Mate Kai. Somehow, Taniwha understood, and projected his fear and pain at the soldier. Jib followed the thought, felt it penetrate the guard's mind, felt it be absorbed harmlessly. The guard fired again. Taniwha leaped in the water, twisting away, but this missile lodged in his flipper.

What's wrong? What's wrong?
Jib thought frantically, pulling the painful object free. He was flooded with chaotic, panicky thoughts from Taniwha, from the herd, all echoing the same question. Helplessly, he watched the guard take aim as Taniwha, exhausted, surrendered and stopped moving.

Then Jib
heard
a stray thought.... A voice he knew .. .

Two brains. The damned things have two
brains! Tell them, Weaver! It's important! You've got to tell them!

Szuyi?

Nearly hallucinating with images and thoughts not his own, Jib stared once more at the guard. He saw the alien head, the sophisticated brain there ...

then followed the spine down into the short, stumpy tail. He remembered the ancient predator... with its tiny, primitive brain ... was this brain more like the Mate Kai's?

Taniwha followed Jib's thought and flung his fear down the guard's spinal channel into the separate nerve cluster hidden there. Instantly the soldier spasmed, collapsed onto his sled, and went into seizures.

Jib grunted as the entire herd joined his mind, searching for the image of the tiny hindbrain. The overload was too great for the human. He felt as if he were being killed by ecstasy and lost himself completely as, with one powerful mind, the Singers united against their enemy.

Bruce felt the warning surge of vibration before he heard anything. "Hurry, Nadine, Szu-yi, your nullifiers!" Their door opened with a rush, and soldiers stormed in,

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grabbing them roughly, hustling them outside with no warning, no explanation. Szu-yi seemed preternaturally calm, though usually the very sight of the soldiers set her twitching.

They're going to kill us,
Bruce decided.
We're too much trouble, so they're
just going to finally kill us.

When they left the building, the guards pushed them and other human prisoners toward the forest.

What the hell's going on?
He searched the sky and saw the great clouds of avians. Then the first bomb hit.

The force of the explosion threw them to the ground. A handful of humans bolted for freedom, and were shot down by the guards. They were playing for keeps, now.

Yanked to their feet, the group was pushed into the forest, but within minutes, something was stampeding toward them, something
big.
The entire group dispersed before the rampaging Quakers, and most of the guards were lost in the shuffle: Bruce grabbed hold of Nadine and Szu-yi and they ran for it, nearly slamming into Meg's sled before they saw her and Old Bear.

"Get on! Get on!" the Russian scientist urged as Bruce shoved the two women aboard, then leaped up behind the Lakota elder.

Meg was waving wildly at the humans as they scattered into the forest, and the ones who saw her followed them deeper into the woods. But within minutes they were surrounded by more Anurans and were forced back toward the River.

He could see Szu-yi plucking at Meg's sleeve, asking her in sign if Weaver had told everyone about the Anurans' brains. She seemed obsessed, the way she often got about odd bits of information these days. Meg patted her, assured her Weaver had told them, but Szu-yi kept signing it over and over, something about the aliens' brains. Bruce was lost.

The Anurans herded Meg and Old Bear east along the River.
Hopeless,
Bruce thought,
but a damned good try.
When he saw soldiers capture Tesa, it broke his heart.

Then, suddenly, the guard nearest him dropped his weapon and blinked dully. Slowly, almost casually, he toppled off his flyer. The Anuran beside him watched in amazement, then collapsed in his turn. One by one the invaders went down, as if the effect were contagious. Some of the fallen ones seizured. Bruce saw a huge shadow growing over them and looked up.

The big ships were gliding downward, out of control. They were going to crash.

Waving his arms at everyone nearby, Bruce signaled, "RUN!"

K'heera pulled her wards down the bank of the river, as far from the fighting as she could get. The terrified Industrious,

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the three drum dancers, and the gravid One-Touch followed her blindly. She turned back in time to see soldiers collapsing, just before Lene fainted.

Within minutes, the Industrious fell prostrate, twitching helplessly. The Simiu halted, baffled, then glanced up in time to see the falling ship.

The drum dancers, unaware of the crashing spacecraft, had continued on.

They waved at her, urging her to follow them. Desperate to stop them, she raced-forward, tackling two of them to the ground. The third stopped to help his friends ward her off, just as the ship sliced off the tops of the nearest trees and demolished the forest beside them. The shock of the crash flung the third Simiu to the ground.

The drum dancers stood dazedly, realizing that the Anurans were helpless, and that K'heera had saved them from being crushed. They glanced nervously at one another, then at K'heera.

She felt the division growing between them again, and would not yield to it.

She had no reason to hang her head anymore, and if they treated her dishonorably, she would not tolerate it.

Then, the three dancers faced her. Kh'arhh'tk, the leader, spoke to her rapidly, no doubt in their own language, completely forgetting that she could hear no more than he could with his sound nullifiers. As he spoke, he gestured at his companions, and K'heera wondered what he was saying.

Could he be thanking me?
she mused. She dismissed the notion. These proud males would never acknowledge being rescued by a Harkk'ett.

Finally, Kh'arhh'tk stopped speaking. He stared at his companions and then, ceremoniously, the three males performed the Mizari honor gesture, a symbol of the highest respect one intelligent creature could have for another.

It was a moment before K'heera let herself realize that they'd performed it for her.

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Epilogue

Tesa was warm, and finally safe, so when she felt herself being jostled, she rolled over to avoid it. Brushing against a soft bundle of feathers, she snuggled against it contentedly. Then she was jostled again. She waved a hand, telling whoever it was to stop, but it wouldn't. Opening her eyes grumpily, she saw a familiar, and normally welcomed, face.

First-Light,
she thought, pulling him down on top of her.

He resisted. "Tesa, not now. We're not alone!"

What?
She glanced around. They were in her lean-to, Javier kneeling over her. Lightning was on her left, it was his warm feathers she'd cuddled into.

Flies-Too-Fast was sleeping soundly on her right, his head still tucked. The sun was bright. Javier must've been up for a while. Whenever he left, the cohort took advantage and resumed their previously privileged positions.

"You've got to get up, Good Eyes," he told her. "The League Irenic Captain, J'karthha, is here to see you."

How did she ever get hooked up with a morning person? Tesa wondered blearily. She'd have to talk to Weaver about that. She sat up, wiping the sleep from her eyes. Then she remembered everything.

It had been a month since the Singers had devastated the Anurans. Two days ago, ships started arriving--Tesa couldn't believe how many ships.

Every vessel that had been within range of Bruce's aborted transmission had responded immediately. They'd come from every Known World, freighters, and barges, and every kind of transport, from economy ships to luxury vessels. Fifteen had arrived in the last two days, and many more were still being turned away.

Last night, two armed ships from the CLS Irenic force arrived. The officer in charge, a Simiu female named J'karthha, had wanted to debark immediately, but when Bruce explained that they had everything under control, she was willing to wait until morning. Now, Tesa couldn't put this off any longer.

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Javier pressed a cup of coffee into her hand. "Try this. It'll help. Old Bear made it."

She nodded, staring at the cup incredulously.
Where did he get coffee!
Oh, yes.

Two days ago Bruce, Martin Brockman, and his crew had taken the repaired
Demoiselle
back to Taller's territory, to find out what happened to the Anurans who'd been left there. They'd carried the Anurans' own weapons ...

something K'heera had suggested.

The Anurans at the quonset hut were either dead or in the same condition most of the others were in--brain-damaged or so physically injured they were no threat. Like the aliens on the River of Fear, only the Industrious seemed undamaged. They'd wakened from their faint confused, but with no other problems.

Good thing,
Tesa thought. Without them, they'd never have been able to care for all the survivors.

In fact, the first crew that had arrived had boarded the space station and were amazed to find that the Singers' mental retaliation was so powerful, it had devastated the Anurans even aboard the
Crane.
There were only a few Industrious, but they knew how to operate the food servers and had kept the injured alive.