Sander took careful aim and fired. His dart struck home, but was partly deflected by a sudden shift of his target, so that it lodged in the shell near the “shoulder” of the creature, but missed the vulnerable patch between chest shield and helmet.
Still his attack appeared to shake the enemy strangely. They ceased advancing and bunched. The one who had been his target worried at the dart shaft until he worked it out of his shell covering. Then he held the weapon up as if considering it unique. Their hollow croaking grew stronger, sounding agitated. Or was that only wishful thinking on his part, Sander wondered?
He had already set another dart in the groove. But the river creatures offered such small unprotected areas that he dared not fire again until he was sure of better success. Fanyi, once more clothed, stretched out now beside him. Her hand covered his on the stock of the thrower.
“Let me hold them while you dress,” she urged. “Under this sun your skin will burn badly if you do not.”
Sander could already feel the heat of the sun. But to leave his post to her—
“Go!” She nudged him hard with her shoulder. “I have used such weapons as this before.” There was an angry note in her voice, as if she resented his hesitation.
The competent way she handled the weapon was evidence that she spoke the truth. He laid three more darts on the stone, then half tumbled down to dress.
Back again on the rock’s crest, he discovered that the fishers had withdrawn to the edge of the “wall” on which he and the girl lay, while the river creatures had apparently recovered from their surprise over the dart and were determinedly crossing the sand and gravel toward them. The creatures hopped rather than walked in men’s fashion, yet they were not slow.
Just as Sander joined her, Fanyi fired. The leader of the water pack dropped his spear. With a loud croak of dismay, he dangled his “hand,” a webbed member with four equal-length digits. The dart had pierced that to form another finger set at an angle.
Once more the enemy bunched to examine their fellow’s hurt. Sander wondered at tactics that seemed stupid to him. These amphibians were well within range of the weapon, yet they gathered around their wounded fellow, interested only in what had happened to him rather than the party on the rocks. The creatures’ seeming disregard of any counterattack by the besieged was puzzling. Perhaps, having spears for weapons, they could not understand a dart that came out of the air. They might even be so stupid or of such an alien way of thought that they did not connect those darts with the party they attacked.
As Fanyi surrendered the thrower to him, she also offered some advice.
“Do not kill unless you are forced to. Death might excite them to vengeance.”
“How do you know that?” Sander demanded.
“I do not know—no, rather, it is that I cannot find words to explain.” She seemed as puzzled now as the river creatures were over the dart. “It is just as I know what my furred ones think and feel. They are disturbed—they fear. But I believe that they can be roused by hate so that their fear will be smothered. Then they will not care how many of them die if only they can reach us. Now—they are of two minds, they half-believe we are such as they cannot profitably hunt.”
Sander could not quite accept that the girl knew this for certain. She must be just guessing. Yet he did not loose any darts even at targets that were tempting. He would wait out this present round of the enemy’s croaking to see what they would try next.
Now that Sander had time to examine more closely their own temporary refuge, he noticed for the first time of the continuity of the blocks of stone on which they rested. This, too, must be some very ancient work of intelligent beings. The sun beat down so fiercely that he squirmed back and forth across the surface on which he lay. To linger here was to invite another kind of disaster.
The party of water creatures moved at last. Two hunched down, holding their spears straight up in the air. The others, including the one with the dart-transfixed “hand,” hopped toward the river.
Sander slipped down. The time to move was now. He guessed that the enemy had gone for reinforcements. And he was sure they themselves could handle the two remaining, if they were trailed on into the desert.
Fanyi agreed to his suggestion. She had been standing, her pendant once more in hand, turned northwest, gazing back along the course of the river down which they had traveled the day before.
“We shall have to stay away from the river,” Sander cautioned. “Water is their element, and they will make the most of it.” Luckily he had filled his bottle this morning before they had crossed the stream. Only, as he surveyed the shimmering heat of the sea-desert, he regretted that there was not a second or third vessel to sling with their gear.
On the other hand, the bare expanse of sand and stone, open to the full rays of the sun, ought to daunt the water people. If they were indeed the amphibian race he judged them to be, they would not choose willingly a long excursion over this scorched land.
In fact, Sander decided, as he examined the territory ahead with narrowed eyes, it might be well if they themselves chose to travel more cautiously. He was well trained in his people’s way of herding under the night stars, using those distant points of light for a guide. At night also they would have fire for a weapon so could travel nearly as well as by day. However, first they must find a place in which to shelter until sundown.
Once more he stated aloud his estimate of their situation. That preoccupied expression smoothed from Fanyi’s face and she dropped the pendant.
“Our seamen also steer by the stars,” she replied slowly. “And I think that the heat of the day here is such as would make any journey an ordeal. Yes, you have judged rightly.”
Again Sander felt a prick of irritation. Of course, he had judged the situation correctly! He did not relish that tone from her, hinting that she must weigh what he said and then agree or disagree. Her statements that her will and power alone had kept her people safe and that it was only because she was elsewhere they had been raided had sounded, and still did, preposterous to him. Shaman she might claim to be, with her tricks of foreseeing and the like, but his people held no faith in anything save their own decisions and actions, and neither did he.
They started off at a jog trot, the fishers bringing up the rear, Rhin once more carrying all their gear except for the bolt thrower Sander held at the ready. The smith had also thrust a half-dozen more bolts into his belt, close to hand. But he wished that he had more. The loss of the two bolts he had already shot was grievous when his armament was so limited.
Rhin, in spite of his pack, forged ahead, ranging back and forth as he was wont to do on the plains when hunting. Sander paused frequently at the beginning of their trek to look back.
If two armored amphibians were indeed pursuing, they managed to make such excellent use of the unevenness of the ancient sea floor as to remain invisible. The farther the fugitives ventured into what was increasingly a salt-encrusted and sere desert, the surer Sander became that beings used to living in water could not trail them hither.
That did not make him relax his vigilance as they headed northwest by his reckoning. Fanyi now and then gazed at her pendant as if it were a sure guide. He himself chose the old method of fixing upon a permanent point, a feature that could not be lost to sight, and aiming at that. Then, having reached that goal, he selected another.
Thirst followed as their boots stirred up a fine dust impregnated with salt. To know that the river with its endless bounty was closed to them, unless sheer desperation forced them to its dangerous flow, irked Sander.
He had experienced heat on the plains, and had ridden far during seasons when water was scarce. But then he had also known the country well enough to assess the chances of finding a spring or one of those seasonally dried streambeds into which Rhin dug with the instinct of his kind to uncover seeping moisture. Where in this forsaken land could they find such?
Every time they paused to rest, the smith climbed the nearest elevation to look, not only back but ahead. If they could just hole up, out of this punishing sun and wait until nightfall.