Now that he was concentrating on it, Jason was aware of the s flow of thoughts around him. The consciousness of the dorym w matched by other like patterns from the rear of the barn. He knew wil out going outside that more of the big beasts were in the field ba there.
“This is all new to me,” Jason said. “Have you ever thought about Naxa? What does it feel like to be a talker? I mean, do you know w it is you can get the animals to obey you while other people have luck at all?”
Thinking of this sort troubled Naxa. He ran his fingers through his thick hair and scowled as he answered. “Nev’r thought about it. Just do it. Just get t’know the beast real good, then y’can guess what they’re going t’do. That’s all.”
It was obvious that Naxa had never thought about the origin of his ability to control the animals. And if he hadn’t, probably no one else had. They had no reason to. They simply accepted the powers of talkers as one of the facts of life.
Ideas slipped toward each other in his mind, like the pieces of a puzzle joining together. He had told Kerk that the native life of Pyrrus had joined in battle against mankind, he didn’t know why. Well, he still didn’t know why, but he was getting an idea of the “how.”
“About how far are we from the city?” Jason asked. “Do you have an idea how long it would take us to get there by dorym?”
“Half day there-half back. Why? Y’want to go?”
“I don’t want to get into the city, not yet. But I would like to get close to it,” Jason told him.
“See what Rhes says,” was Naxa’s answer.
Rhes granted instant permission without asking any questions. They saddled up and left at once, in order to complete the round trip before dark.
They had been traveling less than an hour before Jason knew they were going in the direction of the city. With each minute, the feeling grew stronger. Naxa was aware of it, too, stirring in the saddle with unvoiced feelings. They had to keep touching and reassuring their mounts which were growing skittish and restless. –
“This is far enough,” Jason said. Naxa gratefully pulled to a stop. The wordless thought beat through Jason’s mind, filling it. He could feel it on all sides-only much stronger ahead of them in the direction of the unseen city. Naxa and the doryms reacted in the same way, restlessly uncomfortable, not knowing the cause.
One thing was obvious now. The Pyrran animals were sensitive to psi radiation-probably the plants and lower life fornis as well. Perhaps they communicated by it, since they obeyed the men who had a strong control of it. And in this area was a wash of psi radiation such as he had never experienced before. Though his personal talents speciaiized in psychokinesis-the mental control of inanimate matter-he was still sensitive to most mental phenomena. Watching a sports event, he had many times felt the unanimous accord of many minds expressing the same thought. What he felt now was like that.
Only terribly different. A crowd exulted at some success on the field, or groaned at a failure. The feeling fluxed and changed as the game
progressed. Here the wash of thought was unending, strong am frightening. It didn’t translate into words very well. It was part hatred part fear-and all destruction.
“KILL THE ENEMY” was as close as Jason could express it. But i was more than that. An unending river of mental outrage and death
“Let’s go back now,” he said, suddenly battered and sickened by tb feelings he had let wash through him. As they started the return trip, Ii began to understand many things.
His sudden unspeakable fear when the Pyrran animal had attacke him that first day on the planet. And his recurrent nightmares tha had never completely ceased, even with drugs. Both of these were hi reaction to the hatred directed at the city. Though for some reason h hadn’t felt it directly up until now, enough had reached through to hit to get a strong emotional reaction.