“Oh, come now!” he said, as Veetalya glanced towards the row on shore, and took a stride that brought him within the range of her prong. “A drink is not too much to—”
And snap. At maximum pressure his claws closed on the prong and broke it off, and he was all over her, trusting to his greater weight to force her backward. She wasted her spare pressure on a scream, and that sufficed. He trampled on her as though she were not there and swarmed over the briq’s side into Flapper’s saddle, which the People of the Sea had not found time to dismount. With claws and mandibles and the stub of the prong he slashed at the bonds restraining her, and before the startled crewfolk at the forward end could get to him, he had weakened them enough for the porp to break the rest with one great heave and surge. Half-swamped in a deluge of water, he clung valiantly and jabbed her back with the prong in lieu of a goad. With all her well-fed force she rushed for open water, leaving his captors to fret and curse and hurl obscenities.
The breeze bore him one furious shout: “Well, a courier’s no loss to us, any more than a porp!”
Wrong, promised Tenthag silently. I’m going to cost you more than you can possibly afford!
After so long a period of forced inaction, Flapper rushed straight for the horizon, and he let her go, glad that his provisions had not been pilfered. He drank a lot and ate a little, restoring his normality while calculating how long it would be before the trading on the beach came to an end. If tradition were anything to go by, it would last until dark, and some kind of celebration would follow. The People of the Sea would not dare risk departure without the regular formalities, or even in their debilitated state the Neesans might suspect the trick that had been played on them. Therefore he should have time to swing around on a long circular course and bring Flapper back to the island just after darkfall, when her return was least likely to be noticed.
Cold anger colored his mind gray. Stark facts like distant mountains marked the boundary of his thinking. He was possessed, for the first time in his life, by lust for vengeance.
As darkness fell, he sought the star which had caught his attention at the fringe of the Major Cluster. There was no mistake. It had turned yellower and brighter. Perhaps someone who had not watched the sky from the lonely vantage of a porp’s back in mid-ocean might have overlooked the change, but to Tenthag it was past a doubt.
In ancient times they’d said the stars reflected what went on below. He was too well informed to swallow such deceits. But the image, nonetheless, was powerful, and struck chords in that level of his mind where dreamness ruled.
Perhaps that star was shedding bright new light on what had been dead planets, conjuring the force of life from them. It didn’t matter. For him it was a symbol, and a challenge. He must cast light of his own on his own folk…
Luminants faintly outlined the island, but there were wide gaps where they had not been properly tended and he was able to steal ashore without being spotted. He left Flapper to fend for herself. If he came back by dawn, she would probably still be here; if not, she would shed her saddle as soon as it rotted, but with luck keep the secondary plants Gveest had bestowed on her, which would be an example to any other of the folk who ran across her later on. Maybe, if she bred in the wild, some of them might cross-take on her bud…
Who, though, would help the porps if the Guild of Couriers all met the same doom as Tenthag? In a few years, following the population explosion, they would surely be hunted down for food!
Repressing all such horrible previsions, he crept over the hill-crest on which stood the derelict solar mirror, and found his guesses accurate. Reluctant to leave before sharing refreshment with the local people, the visitors were sitting under arbors of luminants and pretending to be polite. Fifthorch, recognizable by scent and voice, was lavishing on them what food and liquor remained, while others waited in shadow, exuding the stink of greed … or was it from the outsiders? At this distance he could not be certain.