“The barsk—” I began, though why this priest, who had no contact with the supply duties of the temple, would know, I did not guess.
“It was here, when I came seeking you before.” He looked around as if he might be able to conjure that red-furred body out of the ground by eye-search alone. “I remember I remarked to Brother Ofkad, for never have I known a barsk to walk with man before.”
“How long ago was that, brother?”
“Two bell strokes before nooning. The gong spoke even as I left to seek you elsewhere.”
So long a time! I went to Simmle, spoke to her by mind. She barked quickly, in some excitement, and ran to the gate.
“It would seem, brother, that my barsk has gone elsewhere. I must seek him.”
I had warned Krip Vorlund before we entered the Valley of the traps it might contain for those who did not know its ways, or stay within the open ones. Why had he left the temple, I could not guess. Surely nothing that had passed between him and Orkamor could have led to this utter folly. Simmle could follow any trail he had left with ease, but a barsk might cover much ground in the time lapse the priest had mentioned—always providing he had not fallen into any of the trapped ways.
Simmle and I had reached the outer gate of the temple when I heard a hail from behind and turned impatiently to see the young priest who had charge of the guesting court.
“Freesha, they say you seek the barsk.”
“Yes.”
“It cannot be far gone, for it was drinking from the bowl when the messenger came. It is odd-” He hesitated.
“Yes?” I was impatient to be gone.
“It was-it was almost as if the barsk were listening to what we said. It barked when I noticed it. And when I turned again it was gone.”
Could the off-worlder have understood them? The temple priests among themselves spoke the high tongue -and with it mind-touch-until often their speech was sometimes but a word or two, the rest all thought.
“What did you say that the barsk appeared to listen to?”
He did not quite meet my eyes then. “He-Older Brother—asked where you were. I answered that you were in the inner apartments with the protected one. We-we spoke a little of that one. And then the Older Brother said that you awaited those who were bringing a stricken one, but they were not coming. After that he went hence and when I looked—the barsk was gone.”
Had—could Krip Vorlund have been rash enough to go looking for his body? But why had he so rushed forth and not come to me?
I waved Simmle on—
“Find him, girl.” I gave her the order which sent her racing ahead, and I followed, bewildered, shaken, wondering what had changed in that short time when I had sought my own sorrow and forgotten about the purpose which had brought me here.
KRIP VORLUND
XI
I LAY ON THE EARTH and around me the smell of it, of the things that grew, roots set deep in its substance, and of the life that walked it, burrowed through it, was thick, teasing, testing. How far was I now from the Valley, how long the road I skulked along, I did not know as I lay and licked sore paws. I was now more Jorth than Krip Vorlund.
Man? Was there any longer a man who had once been Krip Vorlund? The priests of Umphra reported no party out of Oskold’s territory with the husk of a man. Why, then, had I been brought to the Valley? What purpose had I been meant to serve for Maelen’s desire, not mine? When I heard the priests talk among themselves suspicion had leaped into life, and I thought with new understanding of my interview with Orkamor in the garden of peace.
We talked of worlds beyond, but always he wanted to know of the men who sought out such worlds, of what made them become star rovers. And it seemed to me that he had been trying to learn what manner of man would become a barsk to save his life—as if, by such a chance, I had taken a step from which there might be no return, and if I would accept such a fate for all time.
When Maelen spoke of the exchange, there had been a kind of logic to it. She knew the dangers, ah, how well she knew them. For the priests I had overheard not only spoke of my missing body, but also discussed Maelen and what brought her to the Valley, not once but again and again. There had been another who had run in a beast’s body, at her bidding perhaps. And there had been no return exchange. So the man’s body husk now dwelt in the Valley, and of the beast they did not speak. Or was that unfortunate one caged among her little people?
That perfectly trained company—were they all, or most, once men and women, not animals? Was that how the Thassa recruited their beast shows? Perhaps the name they had given to their performers—”little people”—was entirely apt.
She had long wanted to add a barsk to the company, she admitted that. And I had walked into her trap with the naivete of a trusting child. Or had she brought to bear on me some of her power when my mind had been bewildered? What mattered now was not what had happened and could not be changed, but what might still be done. My body—my man’s body—where was it? If it still lived at all— And to find out I must search Oskold’s land. What I would do if I found it, I had no idea. But for the present the burning need to find it possessed me utterly, past logical reasoning. Perhaps I was no longer quite sane-
Hunger and thirst were dim urges stirring now. I scented man, the odors of a farm holding. And, wincing as I rose on my sore pads, I slipped through the under-brush. How much of the beast served me, I did not know. Man’s knowledge might be an awkward leash upon my hunting skill. In dim twilight, as I stole from shadow to shadow along a wall of loosely piled stone, I was drawn by the messages my nostrils caught and classified.
Meat-saliva dripped from my tongue, my belly growled its emptiness—the scent of meat.
I crouched between two bushes, peering underneath them to an open farmyard. A kas stood stamping heavy hoofs. There were also four of those domesticated animals—forsphi—whose long-fleeced coats provided the raw material for the weaving of a highly weather-resistant cloth. They appeared uneasy, turning their long necks, bending their heads at queer angles, to survey the wall near which I crouched. And one of them voiced deep, coughing grunts of alarm. Just as I scented them, so must they also have picked up my presence.
But what I sought was not one of those, half again as large as I. A fowl picked an erratic path much closer to my hiding place. It was a long-legged creature with a sharply pointed bill which it repeatedly stabbed into the ground. I tensed as it neared. Unlike the animals, it appeared not to have any sense of danger. I burst from my bush and charged it. The bird whirled with a speed which I had not thought possible, and I felt a sharp and piercing pain above one of my eyes. Only a quick flinch saved me from another attack and I fled, blood blinding me on the left, aware that only happy chance had saved my sight.
The clamor of the animals rose as I ran back along the wall and into such cover as I could find. I ran a long distance before my sore paws and laboring lungs forced me to a halt.
Barsks were supposedly wily hunters. But I was not a barsk, I was Krip Vorlund.
I had one advantage not shared by my man body, the night did not blind me. The dark might be my day, which it probably was for a barsk. And before morning I fed, ravenously, certainly not daintily, on a reptilian creature I pawed out from between two stones in a stream bed. Then I found a hollow between a fallen tree and a rock and slept, waking now and then to lick my paws and hope that they were not too raw to carry me onward.
It was better, I decided, to switch traveling by day when I might be sighted to night, which was the natural time for barsk prowling. So I dozed throughout the light hours and limped on when the moon was high.
The Three Rings about that lunar disk were very bright tonight. My barsk head went up and, before I could subdue the impulse, I bayed-my deep cry echoing oddly until it sounded, even to me, more than just that of a night runner saluting the sky rider. There was something in that splendid display which drew and held the eyes, and I could understand why those of Yiktor attributed psychic powers to the rare phenomenon.