a little time alone together.”
XIV
—
First the planet loomed immense in heaven, clouds and ice lending it a
more than Terran whiteness against which the glimpsed oceans became a
dazzlingly deep azure. Then it was no longer ahead, it was land and sea
far below. When Flandry and Kossara bailed out, it became a roar of
night winds.
They rode their gravbelts down as fast as they dared, while the Hooligan
vanished southward. The chance of their being detected was maybe slight,
but not nonexistent. They need have no great fear of being shot at; as a
folk who lived with firearms, the Dennitzans were not trigger-happy.
However, two who arrived like this, in time of emergency, would be
detained, and the matter reported to military headquarters. Hence
Kossara had proposed descending on the unpeopled taiga north of the
Kazan. The voivode of Dubina Dolyina must have patrols and instruments
active throughout his district.
Even at their present distance from it, she and Flandry could not have
left the vessel secretly in an aircraft. The captain of the picket ship
which contacted Chives had settled for a telecom inspection of his
papers, without boarding, and had cleared him for a path through
atmosphere which was a reasonable one in view of his kinetic vector. Yet
orbital optics and electronics must be keeping close watch until
ground-based equipment could take over.
Hoar in moonlight, treetops rushed upward. The forest was not dense,
though, and impact quickly thudded through soles. At once the humans
removed their space-suits, stopping only for a kiss when heads emerged
from helmets. Flandry used a trenching tool to bury the outfits while
Kossara restowed their packs. In outdoor coveralls and hiking boots,
they should pass for a couple who had spent a furlough on a trip afoot.
Before they established camp for what remained of the night, they’d
better get several kilometers clear of any evidence to the contrary.
Flandry bowed. “Now we’re down, I’m in your hands,” he said. “I can
scarcely imagine a nicer place to be.”
Kossara looked around, filled her lungs full of chill sweet-scented air,
breathed out, “Domovina”–home–and began striding.
The ground was soft and springy underfoot, mahovina turf and woodland
duff. A gravity seven percent less than Terran eased the burden on
backs. Trees stood three or four meters apart, low, gnarly, branches
plumed blue-black, an equivalent of evergreens. Shrubs grew in between,
but there was no real underbrush; moonlight and shadow dappled open sod.
A full Mesyatz turned the sky nearly violet, leaving few stars and
sheening off a great halo. Smaller but closer in than Luna, it looked
much the same save for brilliance and haste. No matter countless
differences, the entire scene had a familiarity eerie and wistful, as if
the ghosts of mammoth hunters remembered an age when Terra too was
innocent.
“Austere but lovely,” the man said into silence. His breath smoked,
though the season, late summer, brought no deep cold. “Like you. Tell
me, what do Dennitzans see in the markings on their moon? Terrans
usually find a face in theirs.”
“Why … our humans call the pattern an orlik. That’s a winged theroid;
this planet has no ornithoids.” A sad smile flickered over Kossara’s
night-ivory lips. “But I’ve oftener thought of it as Ri. He’s the hero
of some funny ychan fairy tales, who went to live on Mesyatz. I used to
beg Trohdwyr for stories about Ri when I was a child. Why do you ask?”
“Hoping to learn more about you and yours. We talked a lot in space, but
we’ve our lifetimes, and six hundred years before them, to explain if we
can.”
“We’ll have the rest of them for that.” She crossed herself. “If God
wills.”
They were laconic thereafter, until they had chosen a sleeping place and
spread their bags. By then the crater wall showed dream-blue to south,
and the short night of the planet was near an end. Rime glimmered.
Flandry went behind a tree to change into pajamas. When he came back,
Kossara was doing so. “I’m sorry!” he apologized, and wheeled about. “I
forgot you’d say prayers.”
She was quiet an instant before she laughed, unsteadily but honestly. “I