As the team moved off toward the camp the pilot and engineer of the vessel stood at the foot of the loading ramp watching, not noticing Snark, who had stopped to pick up a replacement filter for the bio-assay machine and now stood just inside the open cargo bay.
“Funny bunch,” the pilot said. “You ever notice their eyes?”
“How could you help but notice. You listen to their mouths going on, this that, this that, all sounding pretty good, then you look at the eyes and see these wild animals glaring at you.”
“Crazy people? With implants, maybe?”
“I dunno. One thing sure. They’re out here on the edge of nowhere and the Ularians are coming.”
“Hush,” said the engineer. “We were told—”
“We were told not to talk. I’m not talking. Hell, how far is it back to where anybody can hear me!”
“I hear you,” said the other, stiffly. “And both of us could get asked what we saw, what we heard. From anybody.”
Snark read the look on the engineer’s face to mean, “And if they ask me, I’ll tell them you were shooting off your mouth!”
“Yeah, well,” said the pilot in sudden discomfort. “We’d best get started back. It feels pretty exposed here. Like somebody might be watching us.”
Snark slipped out of the cargo bay as they went up the ramp, then stood below, watching them. She was remembering another ship, like this ship. Herself going up a ramp just like this one.
Before the lock closed, the pilot risked one more look at the humans moving among the graceless buildings below and mumbled a final comment. To shadows, reading lips was nothing at all, and Snark read the words clearly.
“Bait! That’s what they are. Bait.”
Lutha and Trompe discovered their vehicle could not actually “arrive” at the hive of Cochim-Mahn. It could be driven to a point roughly opposite and above our hive, where the road ended at the edge of the cliffs. A flat triangular chunk of metal hung from the roof beam of the vacant guest house, and before doing anything else, Trompe struck it several times. They both waited as the resultant resonance trembled above the depths, seeming to hang interminably before fading into the daysounds of wind and creature.
We heard it, of course, though songfather hadn’t waited for it. He knew when they were coming. I hadn’t waited for it either. Despite what had happened to me, it was still my duty to clean the quarters of Bernesohn Famber, which I had done, along with airing blankets and sleeping pads for those who were expected.
After a brief wait, Lutha shrugged at the lack of response and carried Leely into the guest house. It had two cramped rooms, a sanitary arrangement added on the back, and a food dispenser wedged into a corner, all very dim behind tightly closed shutters. She stretched and bent, working out the kinks, then lay down on the padded bench, Leely beside her, and fell into a doze. She might have opened the shutters in order to admire the carved and crenellated canyon, the effect of shade and sun as the occasional clouds came sailing over, but both Lutha and Trompe, so she told me later, were sick unto death of canyons.
“I think someone’s coming,” Trompe said after a considerable silence. He lay as he had thrown himself down, in a posture of exaggerated exhaustion, and did not remove his forearm from his eyes as he spoke.
“How do you know?” asked Lutha.
“Hmm.” It was a doubtful sound, as though he didn’t know himself how he knew. “I’m picking up put-upon feelings. Someone out there is feeling overworked and irascible. Angry or aggrieved about something, too. Not us. Or, not us specifically.”
“Ah.” She rose and went out back to consult the sanitary system, returning brushed and furbished. “Still not arrived? When will he get here?”
“Now he’s standing among the trees. Politeness, I think. Waiting until we notice him.”
“If you weren’t a Fastigat, that might take some time.”
“I think his next step may be some throat clearing or modest coughs, growing louder with time.”
Indeed, as she opened the door, the sound she heard was an apologetic cough that seemed to ask, “Was I wanted?”