“easy, wife! stop! stay!”

The words bounced off the warped mirror of her panic. Stubbornly, Rety kept striving against cold stone, groaning and pushing futilely… until…

Something clicked inside her. All at once, she went limp, suddenly resigned to let the mountain do whatever it wanted with her.

Moments after she stopped fighting, the walls miraculously seemed to stop moving. Or had it been her, all along?

“better now? good-good, now move left leg … left! good, stop now. okay roll other way. go-o-o-ood wife!”

His tiny voice was a lifeline she clutched for the few duras — for the eternity — that it took to win Free. At last, the clutch of the stony passage eased, and she slithered down a sandy bank in a flowing, almost liquid liberation that felt just like being born.

When next she looked up, yee had the lantern cradled in both arms, bowing with forelegs bent.

“good brave wife! no wife ever like yee’s amazing wife!”

This time Rety could not hold it in. She covered her mouth with both hands, yet her escaping laughter bounced off the fluted walls. Combed by stalactites, it came back as a hundred soft echoes of her joy to be alive.

The sage was pondering her bird.

He peered at it, wrote on a notepad, then poked it with some shiny tool.

Rety seethed. The gold-green machine was hers. Hers! She had pursued it from the southern marshes to the Rimmers, rescued it from a greedy mulc-spider, won it with her sweat, suffering, and dreams. She would choose who, if anybody, got to study it.

Anyway, what was a savage shaman going to achieve with his crude glass lenses and such? The tools lying near the bird might have impressed the old Rety, who thought Dwer’s hunting bow was so great. But all that changed after meeting Besh, Rann, and the other star-humans. Now she knew — despite all his airs, Lester Cambel was just like Jass or Bom, or any of the other idiots back in the Gray Hills. Stupid braggarts. Bullies. Always taking things that didn’t belong to them.

Under the bright flare of a mirrored oil lamp, Cambel flipped through a book. Its pages crackled, as if they had not been turned in a very long time. Rety couldn’t make out much from her vantage point, perched on a cleft high up one craggy cavern wall. Not that she could read, anyway. Most of each page seemed to be taken up with drawings with lots of little crisscrossing lines. Nothing much resembled a bird.

Come on, yee, she thought, restlessly. I’m countin’ on you!

She was taking a big risk. The little male had assured her he could handle it, but what if he got lost while sneaking around to the other side? Or forgot his lines? Rety would be furious if the little guy wound up getting hurt!

Cambel’s assistant stood up and left the chamber, perhaps on some brief errand, or else to retire for the night. Either way, this was a perfect time! Come on, yee!

After so long writhing through dark passages, always fearful the little candle would go out, Rety found the cool brilliance of the sage’s lamp harsh to the eyes. With reluctance she had blown out her own light while creeping the last few meters, lest its glow draw attention. Now she regretted it. What if I have to retreat the way I came? She couldn’t willingly face that path again. But as a last resort, if someone were chasing her…?

Too bad she had no way to restart the candle. Maybe I should’ve learned to use one of those “match” things the Slopies boast about. She had been too awed by the sudden burst of flame to pay close attention when Dwer, and later Ur-Jah, tried showing how they worked. It was all the fault of Jass and Bom, of course, who didn’t like womenfolk controlling fire on their own.

But fire’s just fine for scaring or burning women, ain’t it? she pondered angrily, touching her face. Maybe I’ll come back someday, Jass. Maybe I’ll bring another kind of fire.

Rety reentered her favorite fantasy, flying off to live with the sky-humans on their home star. Oh, at first she’d start out as a sort of pet or mascot. But just give her time! She’d learn whatever it took in order to rise up, until she became so important…

So important that some great Rothen prince would put a ship — fleet of ships! — at her command, to go with her back to Jijo.

It was fun picturing the look on Jass’s smug handsome face, when the sky over the Gray Hills went dark at noon, and then her words booming from above—

“you wise mister human sir?”

The tiny voice shook her back to the present. She sought down below — and spied yee trotting nervously near the leg of Lester Cambel’s chair.

“Hm? What was that?” Cambel asked, yee jumped as the chair scraped back, pushed by the sage, who peered about in confusion.

“message for wise human! message from wise grandma urs, Ur-Jah!”

Now Cambel looked down, first amazed, then quizzically intrigued.

“Yes, small one? And how did you get down here past the guard?”

“guard he look out for danger, look right past yee. is yee danger?”

The tiny urs laughed, mimicking Rety’s own nervous giggle. She hoped Cambel didn’t recognize the similarity.

The sage nodded, gravely. “No, I suppose not. Unless someone gets you angry, my friend, which I’ll strive not to do. So now, what’s this about a message at this time of night?”

yee did a little dance with his hooves and lifted both arms dramatically, “urgent time for talk-talk, look at dead birdie later! go Ur-Jah now. now!”

Rety feared his vehemence would rouse suspicion. But the balding human put down his tools at once and stood up. “Well then, let’s go.”

Rety’s hopes soared, then sank as Cambel lifted the bird with both hands.

No! Put it down!

As if prodded by her tense mental urging, the sage paused, shook his head, and put the machine back, picking up his notebook instead.

“Lay on, Macduff,” he said to yee, motioning with a sweep of one arm.

“great sage says what?” the small urs tilted his head.

“I said… oh, never mind. An obscure allusion. Guess I’m just tired. Shall I carry you, sir?”

“no! yee lead wise human, walk this way! this way!” and he scampered off eagerly, pausing impatiently and backtracking several times as the sage followed ploddingly behind.

When they both had vanished up the tunnel leading toward the main entrance, Rety wasted no time slithering down the crumbly, slanting limestone wall till she tumbled bottom-first onto the floor of the laboratory cave. She scrambled up and hurried to the table where her bird lay, headless as it had been ever since the fight with the alien robot.

Its breast lay spread open like a carcass at a feast, exposing innards like none Rety had ever seen, glittering like jewels. What did the stinker do, gut it like a herd chick? She fought to check her rage. Rann might not pay if the fools have ruined it by mucking inside!

She looked closer. The opening was too clean to have been hacked with a knife. In fact, when she hesitantly touched the bird’s ribcage, it seemed to roll smoothly around the line where it was still connected — like the hinged door she had seen on a big cabinet, and marveled at, while visiting the forayers’ medical tent.

I see. You just close it like… this.

She lifted the smaller section through an arc, till it swung shut with a decisive click.

Now Rety regretted her haste. There was no more chance to look closer at the little flashings inside. Oh, well. None of my biznis, anyway, she thought, and plucked up her prize. At least I don’t pretend I’m anythin’ but a sooner an’ a savage.

Though not forever. Once I get off Jijo, I’ll learn. I’ll learn all right!

The bird was heavier than she recalled. Briefly, her heart felt full. She had her treasure back! She crammed the heavy bird-thing into her pouch, bypassing the books strewn across the table as she hurried off, following the same path yee and Lester Cambel had taken, an easy stand-up trail leading toward the outside world.