“They’re turning south, Battlemaster,” said Burke.
Beside him, Pallol One-Eye nodded, he who had seen 600 winters upon his own far world and more than a thousand orbits of the nearly seasonless Pliocene Earth. He was taller than the Native American and nearly twice as massive, and he moved as fluidly as the black man-sized otters of the riverine jungle whose form, three times magnified, he often adopted. His right eye was a great orb of gold with an iris colored deep red; the left eye was hidden by a jeweled black leather patch. It was whispered that when he lifted that patch in battle, his glance was more deadly than a thunderbolt, which is to say that the destructive potential of his right-brain’s creativity was second to none among the Firvulag and the Tanu. But Pallol One-Eye was an irascible ancient now, and he had not deigned to soil his obsidian armor at a Grand Combat for more than twenty years, unable to bear his people’s annual humiliation. He had found Madame Guderian’s plan against Finiah to be mildly amusing, and he had acquiesced in a Firvulag role when both Yeochee and the young champion, Sharn-Mes, decided to support the Lowlives. Pallol declared that he would lend the effort his good advice, and he had done so; but it was unthinkable that he should participate personally in what he termed “Madame’s little war.” More likely than not, the assault would be indefinitely postponed when the lady failed to return with the vital materiel. And even if she did bring back the Spear, how could mere humans hope to wield it effectively against the bravos of Velteyn? It was a weapon for a hero! And it was all too true that heroes were in short supply among this effete younger generation.
“Now they’re crossing the Rhine, heading west into the Belfort Gap,” Burke said. “No doubt planning to convoy the last caravan from Castle Gateway before the Truce.”
Still Pallol only nodded.
“The Tanu can’t have any inkling of our preparations, Battlemaster. We’ve carried it off without a flaw.”
This time Pallol laughed, a grating sound like the chafing of lava blocks. “Finiah shines bright across the river, Leader of Humans. Save your self-congratulation for its snuffing. Madame Guderian will not return and all of this scheming against the torc-wearing Foe will be for nothing.”
“Perhaps so, Battlemaster. But even if we don’t fight, we’ve accomplished things that we never dared dream of before. Nearly five hundred Lowlives have been brought together in a common cause. Only a month ago, that would have been an idle fancy. We were scattered and afraid, mostly without hope. But not any more. We know that there is a chance that we can break the Tanu domination of humanity. If you Firvulag help us, we can do it sooner. But even if you break off the alliance, even if Madame fails to bring back the Spear this year, we’ll return to fight again. After this, humans will never go back to the old timid ways. Others of us will go searching for the Ship’s Grave if Madame fails. We’ll find that ancient weapon and make it work again, something your people could never do. And if the Spear is gone, if we never find it, we’ll use other weapons until the Tanu slavers are defeated.”
“You mean you will use the blood-metal,” said Pallol.
Chief Burke was silent for a dozen seconds. “You know about the iron.”
“The senses of the torc-wearers may be so puny that they require machines to sniff the deadly metal out, but not those of the Firvulag! Your camp reeks of iron.”
“We will not use it against our friends. Unless you plan betrayal, you have nothing to fear. The Firvulag are our allies, our brothers-in-arms.”
“The Tanu Foe are our true brothers and yet we are fated to contend with them eternally. Could it be otherwise between Firvulag and humanity? This Earth is destined to belong to you, and you know it. I do not believe that humanity will be satisfied in allowing us to share. You will never call us brothers. You will call us interlopers and try to destroy us.”
“I can speak only for myself,” Burke said, “since my tribe, the Wallawalla, becomes extinct upon my death. But there will be no treachery by human against friendly Firvulag as long as I am the general of the Lowlives, Pallol One-Eye. I swear it on my blood — which is as red as your own. As for our never being brothers… this is a matter I’m still pondering. There are many different degrees of kinship.”
“So thought our Ship,” sighed the old champion. “It brought us here.” He tilted his huge head toward the sky. “But why? With so many other yellow stars in the universe, so many possible planets, why here, with you? The Ship was instructed to find the best.”
“Perhaps,” said Peopeo Moxmox Burke, “the Ship took a longer view than you.”
All day long the birds of prey had circled.
They rode thermals above the Vosges woodland in a neat stack, holding most of the time at altitudes appropriate to their species. Lowest was a wheeling flock of small swallow-tailed kites; above them soared a mated pair of bronze buzzards; the fire-backed eagles came next, and then a lone lammergeier vulture, mightiest of the bone crackers. Most lofty of all the circling birds was the one that had initiated the daylong vigil and attracted all of the others. On motionless wings, it orbited at a height so remote that it was barely visible to watchers on the ground.
Sister Amerie watched the birds through the sparse branches of a stone pine, her tawny cat resting in her arms. “ ‘Wherever the body is, there will the eagles be gathered together.’ ”
“You quote the Christian scriptures,” said Old Man Kawai, who was shading his eyes with a tremulous hand. “Do you think the birds are truly clairvoyant? Or do they only hope, as we do? It is late, so late!”
“Calm yourself, Kawai-san. If they get here tonight, there’ll be a whole twenty-four-hour day for the Firvulag to join in the assault. That should be enough. Even if our allies withdraw at sunrise day after tomorrow, we can still win with the help of the iron.”
The ancient continued to fret “What can be keeping Madame? It was such a slim hope. And such hard work we have done here in expectation that the hope would be fulfilled!”
Amerie stroked the cat. “If they arrive before dawn tomorrow, the attack can still proceed according to the second alternative.”
“Ifthey arrive. Have you considered the navigation problem? Richard must come first to Hidden Springs. But how will he find it? Surely these tiny mountain valleys must look much alike from the air, and ours is hidden because of the Hunt. Richard will not be able to distinguish our canyon, even in daylight, if he approaches at a high altitude. And he does not dare to fly a low-level search, lest the enemy observe him.”
Amerie was patient. “Madame will conceal the ship mentally, of course. Calm yourself. This constant worry is bad for your health. Here, pet the cat. It’s very soothing. When you stroke the fur, you generate negative ions.”
“Ahsodesuka?”
“We can hope that the flyer would be equipped with an infrared scanner for night flight, just as our eggs of the twenty-second century were. Even with all of our fighters gone, there are still more than thirty warm bodies here in Hidden Springs. Richard will sniff us out.”
Old Man Kawai sucked in his breath. A horrible thought of a new sort crossed his mind. “The metapsychic concealment of the aircraft! If its volume is more than about ten cubic meters, Madame will be unable to render it invisible! She will only be able to disguise it somehow and hope that the Tanu do not concentrate their perceptive powers too closely upon it. What if the machine is so large that her faculties are insufficient to invest it with a plausible illusion?”
“She’ll think of something.”
“It is a great danger,” he moaned. The little cat gave him a long-suffering glance as his hand essayed a few nervous pats. “The Flying Hunt could even discover the aircraft while it rests here! All that is needed is for Velteyn to descend for a close look at my poor camouflage nets. They are pathetic things.”