Dare to Go A-Hunting ft-4

  Dare to Go A-Hunting

  ( Free Traders - 4 )

  Andre Norton

  Dare to Go A-Hunting by Andre Norton

  Chapter One

  It was warm, too warm for one of the room's inhabitants. However, it was probably discourteous to remark upon the heat though a round drop of sweat gathered just below one of his slightly slanted eyes to trickle down his cheek. There was a small rustle when he shifted position on the uncushioned stool which supported him an uncomfortable height from a floor of tiles matched in brilliant color to form patterns which he could only glance at or it made his eyes ache. That his host not only accepted all this as natural, but took comfort in it was one of those irritating situations which had filled Farree's life for some time.

  He had seen aliens a-plenty during his bad time in that sleazy portside district, the Limits, which formed his earliest memories. However, such strangers in their own homes were something he was now only being introduced to by the full swing of fate's finger crystal.

  "Hot" Togger's thought, always pitched so high that his own sense could hardly understand, came testily. Farree's jerkin heaved and wrinkled as the smux crawled out into the open to gaze up into his face with stalked eyes.

  "Soooo—it is hot, little one?" Not a thought this time but words uttered with a hissing intonation. At a goodly distance down the room a third inhabitant arose, the extended talons on his webbed and scaled feet scraping across the stone pattern on the floor. "Courtesy is all very well, my little friends, but allow me also the privilege of displaying it." A yellow scaled arm, banded at both wrist and above the elbow with well-worn cuffs of an iron-hard wood, reached out to the wall and flipped a switch.

  There was no sound of any winds, yet there blew across the room now a swift breeze, tepidly warm to be sure, but at least better than the slow baking heat it disturbed. He who had summoned that now came threading a path between small tables and large—all piled with learning tapes and scan plates in boxes. Farree gave a, he hoped, concealed sigh of relief. Those folds draped across his shoulders, extending down his back so that their edges swept the floor, rose in turn. He did not flourish the wings in full display—he needed more room for that—but at least he could give them a stretch.

  The tall old alien watched Farree almost eagerly. He had swept a whole cascade of scan plate boxes to the floor and seated himself with a little grunt and some rubbing of one scaled and plated knee.

  Then he leaned forward, setting the palms of his hands on both knees. Farree did not know how long Zacanthans continued to inherit this plane of existence (which was how they referred to life and death) but he was sure that Grand Hist-Technneer Zoror was indeed a long-time master of that skill which, as with all his species, centered upon the collection of information about oddities in a well-spread galaxy– especially the history of such new races as were introduced from time to time into the records of exploration. They were indeed long-lived, these lizardlike people, but even the oldest of them often asserted that he was only beginning his labors.

  "Soooo—" Once more Zoror made a hissing of the word. "You wish now that this old man of scales would come directly to the point and tell you what you are and from whence you have come." The Zacanthan nodded so that the pleated frill of skin which lay about the back of his head and shoulders unfolded into a fan like some large ornamental collar.

  "It is not easy, you know," Zoror continued. "We cannot walk to the records and say 'Tell me who is this winged one? From what earth and people did he spring?' These," he again flung out an arm to gesture at the unwieldy piles of tapes and spools fencing them both in, "these are records of voyages, many, many voyages, also contributed by men who tell strange tales, sometimes merely out of their own imagination, but other times bearing a truth which—if the Ever Mighty is helpful—can be traced about this far!" He held up a hand to display a thumb and forefinger with a space between them maybe as big as one of Togger's second claws.

  "There—there was nothing then?" Farree had curbed his patience all morning, ever since all he could remember had been fed into the read-all of the big computer. His scant store of information had been recorded to match mixtures of still dubious details.

  "No, I do not say that. There are stories of such as you. Those come from the bards of Loel, the Rememberers of Garth, the Dance-think of Udolf. Stories, mind you, garnered on more than a hundred planets. But—it remains that they are stories without concrete proof. Those who retell them gather details on this world or that. But the strongest of all—those come from Terra—"

  "Terra? But that is but a tale, too." Farree did not try to hide his disappointment.

  "Not so—" Zoror's neck frill fluttered as he shook his head. "However, there is something common to all the worlds from which the clearest and most detailed of these stories come. Those were the planets first colonized by people from Terra. Yes, most certainly there was a Terra. It bred several races, in all of which there was one abiding gift, that of curiosity. Terrans were not the first explorers of the space dark, yet they spread farther in leas time than many of those who came before. And with them they brought, as we all do, tales which were old and yet part of their lives."

  Farree's face creased in a frown. Zoror, for all his learning, was apt to tell stories, too. Ordinarily Farree would have listened with interest. However, what he wanted now was truths, even if they afforded only a very thin thread to trace. "These from Terra—they were certainly not like me." He put up a hand to touch the edge of one wing.

  "No. They were not Farree's—" Zoror assured him. "Only stories of such they did carry. In their tales—much of this was researched and put together by Zahaj in a mist of years ago—in their tales they spoke of 'Little People', which lived sometimes underground—"

  Farree unfolded his wings another fraction. "With these they could not!" he countered.

  "True, true. But there were different species or races of them. Some were wingless according to the tales. They all had a strange relationship with the men of Terra. Sometimes they were good friends, again they were blood enemies. It is said that they often stole the children of men and raised them, to renew and enrich their own blood. For they were very old so at times their race dwindled until only a handful of them remained. They were supposed to have great treasures– perhaps even records!" Zoror's voice soared high. "Only there always came a time when the men drove them from their homes—perhaps not wantonly (though there are legends about such deeds as that also) but because they held land men wanted. And all know the stories of the ever-living greed of Terra which spread like a mist-dark cloud wherever their ships touched, until there came the Great Reckoning.

  "Before that these winged and unwinged ones fled along the star roads not knowing where they might land. They found worlds to settle for a space. But always the same such worlds drew the Terrans. They would come so that the Little People must once more take to space. This has happened many times over, judging by legends we have recorded. However, at last there were no more reports of them, only what remained in songs and stories."

  "Did they war with the Terrans then?" Farree's mouth was dry. He must have squeezed Togger too hard for the smux twisted about and gave a warning nip to a finger.

  "There was a war, yes, though we hear little of that– mainly a ballad over some Terran killed by the evil magic of the Little People.. From Udolf, for example, there comes a whole set of dance songs lamenting some leaders who died from weapons known to the Little People alone. They must have practiced also some form of mind control, for they would keep men within their hold for what seemed a day or a year and then let their captives go, for them to discover that they had really been gone from their homes for a matter of years. There is als
o the Mingra report. Come and see for yourself."

  Farree followed the Zacanthan to the larger table where there were even more piles of tapes balanced perilously. Zoror began to clear these away, piling them on the floor. Farree stooped quickly to help him, folding his wings tight again lest he cause some disaster.

  "This is old, too, by the reckoning of most." The Hist-Technneer was fussing with a reader, making sure the machine was in proper position.

  "Mingra?" That was a word Farree had never heard before.

  "The darkened world—the world of the dead-alive—" Zoror was more intent on the disc he was fitting into the reader than he was to any question. "Now this"—he gave the roll a last turn, slipping it into place—"was the Shame of Mingra, the Shame of all who are space travelers—though perhaps it has so faded during the years that it is only alive as a poisonous whisper by now. Watch with care—for into it has gone the hate of one species for another and yet there is nothing to explain—"

  His voice died away in a final hiss. Farree obediently looked at the small screen. Togger moved impatiently in his grasp until he placed the smux down carefully on the table before the screen. Togger drew himself into a ball and perhaps went to sleep. For Farree there was no sleep. He had seen plenty, since his arrival at Zoror's home which was also headquarters for a whole quadrant of researchers, of such records. Some had been so wildly fantastic that he had been sure they were indeed travelers' tall tales and not any true garnering of knowledge,

  A picture formed on the screen. Farree jerked, half arose from his seat. For there was not only an ominous picture of a sphere, half lit at one edge by a red beam. But in his head—

  He could not say it was a song, he could not even distinguish what must be wholly alien words. Yet deep into him had struck the thought-feeling that this held a truth which was evil and powerful. Gripping the edge of the table he made himself sit again but he did not loose his sustaining hold.

  "Hurt—dark—hurt—" The smux had unrolled from his sleep ball and crouched before the screen, waving his great claws back and forth as if he were facing some dire danger.

  That thread of sound swelled and, as if it called for sight, the red light on the screen blazed higher to display a barren stretch of riven rocks which were eroded, or perhaps storm-clawed, into ridges and plateaus. Shadows still clung to the feet of those outcrops and these dark wisps moved as if thrown by some source other than the rocks against which they sulked.

  There was fear—a fear which arose and strengthened– which began to twist within Farree. A pile of reading rolls crashed to the floor as his wings answered to the unconscious stimulus.

  With the speed of a laser shot a head flashed into the bloody light. It was the epitome of all evil Farree had ever known. It clashed broken-toothed jaws together, and eyes like pits with a fire deep held stared straight at him.

  It knew, it hated, it was coming from him! And it was—

  "Boogy—" The hissing of Zoror broke that fearful hold which the screened creature had half woven about Farree– either to draw him into its place or to burst forth from the screen—how could it? This was unlike any reading roll he had seen. From whose mind had this horror been shifted for future study—and where—when—?

  "This was a collective nightmare," Zoror said. Farree heard him but more than half of his own attention was still centered on that thing. It had emerged from the shadow now. The mist lay shrunken behind as if its substance had been stolen to give the creeper more reality. Creep the creature did. Stunted limbs supported it—no, not limbs but rather thick tentacles; and Farree believed that he could actually hear the sound of suckers being pulled loose from the rock to be set again as it advanced.

  Nightmare? This was more alive than any nightmare. Enough to bring death if it struck through sleep.

  "Which it did," the Zacanthan said. "Look to the rocks at the right, my little friend."

  Farree felt that if he withdrew his attention from the crawler he would leave an opening for attack, even if this was a read-roll. However, he gave a quick glance in the direction the Zacanthan suggested.

  There was no shadow at the foot of this standing stone; rather it was crowned with such. The form was humanoid and—Farree sucked in a breath and swallowed a cry. For it was a winged one standing there, and he knew without being told that this one controlled the creeper, was sending it at some prey, not to slay—at least not at first—but to torment with fear. A winged one. He gave it full attention now. Its flesh, shown in limb and arm and face, was a dirty grey. The eyes, like those of the thing it commanded, were red and burning. About its body was tight clothing, also of a red to match the ever-lightening sky. Those wings which lazily fanned the air were not like Farree's, broad and colored, with one hue melting into another, so that full-spread the pinions were things of soft beauty. No, this leader of merciless shadows had wings which lacked the feathery down which covered Farree's. Instead they were the same foul greyish shade as the skin. Spread out they displayed perilous-appearing hooks at the top.

  "Winged—" Farree half whispered. To the fear which still coiled within him was added now true horror. Was this what could claim him as kin—in spite of Zoror's talk about true tales and false? Somehow he knew that this was a true tale—

  "Only to two." Zoror picked up his thought, and, for the first time since he had discovered his gift because he could communicate with smux, Farree resented that this was so.

  "Two," Zoror leaned over and one of his well-smoothed finger claws touched a control which sent the screen dead again. Yet when Farree looked at it, he could still see that abomination winged and aloft on the rock waving forward the horror born of shadows.

  "The two," the Zacanthan was proceeding, "being he who dreamed and he, or perhaps it, who sent such a dream! This was taken from the dream sleep of a small child, one of the many who were brought for treatment from Mingra to Yorum well over a hundred planet years ago. Five only of those little ones survived. The rest—nightmares such as you have just seen pursued them, until some died of fear alone and some then retreated so far from the outer world in their terror that none could reach within where they cowered. Thus they became the lost which we could not help."

  "But you speak of shame—" countered Farree. He had seen what could be unending fear perhaps, but there was no shame that he could understand. Any child, yes, and fully grown adult, too, would have no shame for such fear.

  "There was on Mingra a colony of dream-sleepers and they were learning how to control their dreams," Zoror explained. "When they were called upon to help, when children howled and screamed in their sleep—they fled and refused any aid. Those who dream-sleep hover always on the thin line of what most men call madness. They have been known to strike out in their sleep, even take up weapons in their hands, to the hurt of any who may be with them. Thus they are sent into wilderness until they learn to control their powers. If this dream recording you have seen worked upon you, think what it might have done to one who was drilled to be sensitive to such encounters? It was not only themselves that the dream-sleepers sought to protect. However, men and women who had seen their children rave in their sleep, a sleep from which there seemed to be no waking, no matter how the medical officers of that colony tried to rouse them—such are not always answerable for red terror which they wreak on their own. There was a wild descent upon the colony of the sleepers. They were taken and given to pain of many kinds when they said they could not awaken nor help the children. They died, not quickly or easily. It was a ship of the Patrol on a regular duty that landed on a planet where hands were bloody and more than one mind could no longer bear the burden of remembering what had happened. The children who had survived that long, and that were very few of those, were brought to Yorum and there healers of the mind wrought ceaselessly to banish the boogyman—"

  "The boogyman," repeated Farree.

  "That is the name they screamed out of their sleep. However, it was a name which was already very old—another bit of Ol
d Terra come to the stars. For the boogyman was an old creation designed to frighten children into good behavior. And we discovered that some tales of such had been told on Mingra where they were deemed harmless and amusing."

  "Harmless? Amusing?" Farree sputtered. "But that was a scene of evil! What child could build such a dream? Unless his race was one of swift punishment and violent tempers?"

  "Which they were not—until the plague drove them into such action," the Zacanthan replied. "Nor were any of the dream-sleepers so unstable that they played thus with their own gift. As you must have heard, those who dream-sleep are under vows which are set in their very innermost spirits so that their work can draw no ill upon anyone. However, all the children we were able to draw dream pictures from were caught in the same general horror. And you did not see the worst of this, my small friend. There are some dream pictures locked in stasis since only the very steady and exceptionally well stabilized dare look at them. To dream alike is possible– the dream-sleepers have brought that to a high art. Those who are trained almost from birth can serve for communication even between worlds.

  "Therefore if the children were all haunted by the same dream then that dream had a pattern. The Patrol, my own staff, others with one power and another, strove to find the source of this common dream but to no avail. What we did discover was that through that section of the galaxy, comprising some five solar systems, there was uneasiness, there had been riots, even small wars fought. Also there was a rumor which will have meaning to you—the enemy sought was a winged race. Yet no man had actually seen any such, though our net of inquiry was far spread and touched some sources which were usually closed to authority—the Thieves' Guild for example.

  "But the outbreak on Mingra appeared to be the end. There were no more nightmares, even though volunteers of trained tenth class dreamers offered their services to the search. Then the Patrol and the authorities said that the whole thing was doubtless started by either some mischief (those who said that had to lie away the very evidence before their eyes) or by a tendency to sensitiveness which was awakened by the old tales. It was then that authority set upon the settlers the brand of Shame for the massacre of the dream-sleepers, and all was to be left alone, with no more time or trouble about the outbreak which, after all, was a very small happening compared to the violence which is ever snapping at the heels of sanity in all inhabited worlds."