The Iron Breed (34 page)

Furtig's startled jump almost brought him to disaster. For he struck against what seemed a smaller table, and that moved! He whirled around, expecting an attack, snarling. The table went on until it bumped against one of the larger tables.

Warily Furtig hooked his claws lightly about one of its slender legs. Very cautiously he pulled the small table back. It answered so readily, he was again startled. Then he mastered surprise, and experimented.

The surface was high, he could barely touch the top with his chin when he stood at his tallest. There was a mass of brittle stuff lying across it, and when he tried to investigate, it broke and powdered, so that he swept it off, leaving a bare surface.

But he could move the table!

Pushing and pulling, he brought it out of the room, back to the side of the rumbler. Luckily there was only a short space between the two levels, the table being a little lower. He was sure he could get Foskatt from one to the other.

Blood was seeping again from the matted fur about Foskatt's wound by the time Furtig had finished. He settled the unconscious tribesman in the center of the table, hoping he would not roll, as there was no anchorage here.

He fastened his belt to the two front legs of the table and then slung the end over one shoulder. It was a tight fit, the table bumping continually against his back and legs, and if it had not rolled so easily he could not have moved it. Resolutely he set out down the corridor.

There were times following, which could have been night and day, or day and night, since Furtig could no longer measure time so here—times when he believed that he could not go on. He would hunch down, the table looming over him, breathing so hard it hurt his lower ribs. His whole body was so devoted to pulling the table that he was not really aware of anything save that he had not yet reached the place to which he must go.

On and on, and there was no end, from corridor to room, across room, to another hall. The lights grew brighter, the strange smells stronger. He was never sure when the vibration in the walls began. It might have started long before his dulled senses recorded it. There was a feeling of life here . . .

Furtig leaned against the wall. At least there was no smell of Ratton. And they were still heading in the right direction.

Then he really looked about him. The corridor down which they had just come ended at a wall. And if this was like the wall the servant had opened, well, he did not have the ability to get through it. Leaving the table, he shambled forward to examine it better.

What was happening to him? This was the bottom of a shaft, much the same as the one he had fallen down earlier. But now—he was going up! Gently, as if the air itself was pushing him.

Frantically Furtig fought, managed to catch hold of the shaft entrance and pull out of that upward current. As he dropped to the ground, he was shaken out of that half-stupor which had possessed him.

It was plain, as plain as such a marvel could be, that here the shaft reversed the process of the other one. And it was also plain that Gammage—or what his search sense had fastened on as Gammage—was above.

Would this mysterious upward current take the table also? He could only try. Pulling, he got it into the shaft. Foskatt's body stirred, drifting up from the surface. So—it worked on him, but not on the table. Wearily Furtig accepted that, kept his hold on his tribesman as they began to rise together.

It took a long time, but Furtig, in his weariness, did not protest that. He watched dully as they slid past one opening and then another. Each must mark a different level of these vast underground ways, even as the caves opened from two ledges. Up and up—

Four levels up and Furtig's search sense gave the signal—this one! Towing the limp Foskatt, he made swimming motions to take them to the opening. And he had just enough strength to falter through, out of the pull of the current, to the floor beyond.

He lay there beside Foskatt, panting, his sides and back aching from his effort. What now? But he was too worn out to face anything more—not now. And that thought dimmed in his mind as his head fell forward to rest on his crooked arm.

5

Furtig came out of sleep, aware even before he opened his eyes that he was not alone. What he sniffed was not the musky scent of Ratton, but rather the reassuring odor of his own kin. With that, another smell, which brought him fully awake—food! And not the dried rations of his traveling either.

He was lying on a pallet not unlike those of the caves. And, waiting beside him, holding a bowl which sent out that enticing fragrance, was a female he had never seen before. She was remarkable enough to let him know he was among strangers. And he gaped at her in a way which should have brought her fur rising, set her to a warning hiss.

Fur—that was it! Though she had a goodly show of silky, silvery fur on her head and along her shoulders, yet on the rest of her body it was reduced to the thinnest down, through which it was easy to see her skin.

And those hands holding the bowl—the fingers were not stubby like his own but longer, thinner. Furtig did not know whether he liked what he saw of her, he was only aware that she was different enough to keep him staring like a stupid youngling.

“Eat—” She held the bowl closer. Her voice had a tone of command. Also it was as different as her body was from those he knew.

Furtig took the bowl and found its contents had been cut into easily handled strips. As he gnawed, and the warm, restorative juices flowed down his throat, he came fully to attention. The female had not left and that disconcerted him again. Among the People this was not the custom—the males had their portion of the caves, the females another.

“You are Furtig of the Ancestor's cave—”

“How did you—”

“Know that? Did you not bring back Foskatt, who knows you?”

“Foskatt!” For the first time since his waking, Furtig remembered his tribesman. “He is hurt—the Rattons—”

“Hurt, yes. But he is now in the healing place of the Demons. We”—there was pride in her tone—“have learned many of the Demons' secrets. They could heal as well as kill. And every day we learn more and more. If we are given the chance we shall know all that they knew . . .”

“But not to use that knowledge to the same purposes, Liliha.”

Startled, Furtig looked beyond the female. The soft tread of any of his race should not be entirely noiseless, but he had been so intent he had not been aware of a newcomer. And looking up—

“Famed Ancestor!” He set down the bowl with a bump which nearly shook out what was left of its contents, hastened to make the gesture of respect due the greatest Elder of them all. But to his pride (and a little discomfort, were the full truth to be known), Gammage hunkered down by him and touched noses in the full acceptance of the People.

“You are Furtig, son of Fuffor, son of Foru, son of another Furtig who was son of my son,” Gammage recited as a true Elder, one trained to keep in memory clan and tribe generations through the years. “Welcome to the lairs, warrior. It would seem that your introduction here has been a harsh one.”

Gammage was old; the very descent lines he had stated made him older than any Elder Furtig had ever known. Yet there was something about him which suggested vigor, though now perhaps more vigor of mind than of body.

Like the female's fur, though she was clearly young and not old, Gammage's body fur was sparse. And that body was thin, showing more bony underlining than padded muscle.

He wore not just the belt common to all the People but a long piece of fabric fastened at his throat, flowing back over his shoulders. This somehow gave him added stature and dignity. He also had about his neck a chain of shining metal links and from that hung a cube not unlike the one Foskatt had carried. While his hands—

Furtig's gaze lingered. Whoever had he seen among the People with such hands! They were narrower, the fingers longer and thinner even than those of the female. Yes, in all ways Gammage was even stranger than the old tales made him.

“Eat now.” Gammage gestured to the bowl. “Within the lairs we need all the strength food can give us. Rattons”—his voice deepened to a growl—“Rattons establishing their own place here! Rattons attempting to gain Demon knowledge! And so little time perhaps before we shall be called upon to face the Demons themselves.” Now his voice became a growl without words, the sound of one about to offer battle.

“But of that we can speak later. Furtig, what say they of me now in the caves? Are they still of like mind—that I speak as with the mindless babble of the very young? The truth, warrior, the truth is of importance!”

And such was the compelling force of the Ancestor's tone that Furtig answered with the truth.

“The Elders—Fal-Kan—they say that you plan to give Demon secrets to strangers, even to the Barkers. They call you—”

“Traitor to my kind?” Gammage's tail twitched. “Perhaps in their narrow viewing I might be termed so—now. But the day comes when the People, plus the Barkers, plus the Tusked Ones, will have to stand together or perish. Of the Rattons I do not speak thus, for there is that in them akin to what I have learned of the Demons. And when the Demons return, the Rattons may run with them to overturn all our lives.”

“The Demons return?” Listening to the note of certainty in the Ancestor's voice made Furtig believe that Gammage was sure of what he said. And if he truly believed that, yes, would it not be better to make truce even with Barkers against a common and greater enemy?

“Time!” Gammage brought those odd hands of his together in a clap to echo through the room. “Time is our great need and we may not have it. We have so many lesser needs, such as the one which took Foskatt into that section of the lairs we had not fully explored, seeking hidden records. But, though he did not find what he sought, he has alerted us to this new danger, a Ratton base on the very edge of our own territory. Let the Rattons learn but this much”—Gammage measured off between two fingers no more than the width of one of them—“of what we have found here, and they will make themselves masters, not only of the lairs, but of the world beyond. Say that to your Elders, Furtig, and perhaps you will find they will listen, even though they willfully close their ears to a worse threat.”

“Foskatt was seeking something?”

Gammage had fallen silent, his eyes on the wall beyond Furtig, as if he saw there something which was as plain to be read as a hunting trail, and yet to be dreaded.

“Foskatt?” Gammage repeated as if the name were strange. Then once more his intent gaze focused on Furtig. “Foskatt—he was hardly handled, near to ending, when you brought him back to us, warrior. But now he heals. So great were the Demons—life and death in their two hands. But they played games with those powers as a youngling plays with sticks or bright stones, games which have no meaning. Save that when games are played as the Demons play them, they have grim consequences.

“They could do wonderful things. We learn more and more each day. They could actually make rain fall as they pleased, keep the sun shining as they would. There was no great cold where they ruled and—But they were not satisfied with such, they must do more, seeking the knowledge of death as well as of life. And at last their own learning turned against them.”

“But if they are all dead, why then do you speak of their return?” Furtig dared to ask. His initial awe at seeing Gammage had eased. It was like climbing a mountain to find the way not so difficult as it had looked from the lowlands. That Gammage could impress, he did not doubt. There was that about him which was greater than the Elders. But he did not use it consciously as they did to overawe younger tribesmen.

“Not all died,” Gammage said slowly. “But they are not here. We have tracked them through this, their last lair. When I first began that search we found their bodies, or what was left of them. But once we discovered the knowledge banks we also uncovered evidence that some had withdrawn, that they would come again. It was more concerning that second coming that Foskatt sought. But you will learn, Furtig—There is so much to learn—” Again Gammage gazed at the wall, rubbing one hand on the other. “So much to learn,” he repeated. “More and more we uncover Demon secrets. Give us time, just a little more time!”

“Which the Rattons threaten now.” Liliha broke into the Ancestor's thoughts, amazing Furtig even more. The fact that she had not withdrawn at Gammage's arrival had surprised him. But that she would speak so to the Ancestor, almost as if to an unlessoned youngling, bringing him back to face some matter which could not be avoided, was more startling yet.

However Gammage appeared to accept her interruption as proper. For he nodded.

“True, Liliha, it is not well to forget today in considering tomorrow. I shall see you again and soon, cave son. Liliha will show you this part of the lairs which we have made our own.”

He pulled the fabric tighter about him and was gone with the speed of a warrior years younger. Furtig put down the bowl and eyed the female uncertainly. It was plain that the customs of the caves did not hold here in the lairs. Yet it made him uncomfortable to be left alone with a Chooser.

“You are not of the caves,” he ventured, not knowing just how one began speech with a strange female.

“True. I am of the lairs. I was born within these walls.”

That again amazed Furtig. For all his life he had heard of warriors “going to Gammage,” but not females. But that they carried on a normal manner of life here was a minor shock. Until he realized the limit of his preconceptions concerning Gammage's people. Why should they not have a normal life? But whence had come their females?

“Gammage draws more than just those of his own tribe,” she went on, as if reading his thoughts. “There are others of the People, on the far side of the lairs, distant from your caves. And over the seasons Gammage has sent messengers to them also. Some listen to him more closely than his blood kin seem to.” Furtig thought he detected in that remark the natural air of superiority which a Chooser would use on occasion with a warrior.

“There is now a new tribe here, formed from those of many different clans,” she continued in the same faintly superior tone. “It has been so since my mother's mother's time. We who are born here, who learn early the knowledge of the Demons, are different in ways from those outside the lairs, even from those who choose to join us here. In such ways as this do the In-born differ.” She put forth her hand, holding it in line with Furtig's. Not with their flesh, making contact, but side by side for comparison.