"You don't want revenge? On Lychen we'd-"
"Is Lychen a vendetta world?"
"Not exactly, but we have pride."
"The old families," corrected Dumarest. "The established clans. Only the rich can afford the type of revenge you're talking about. Only the stupid would pursue it. Families locked in strife, killing each other, using assassination, anything, just to level the score. After a while even the cause of the quarrel is forgotten but the killing goes on."
"And pride remains."
Dumarest said, dryly, "Which, no doubt, is a great comfort to those who bury the dead."
He leaned back, running strands of grass between his teeth, watching Angado's face, illuminated by the glow from the fire, harden from what it had been and not just through loss of underlying fat. The journey was forcing him to face reality; pressure accentuated by Dumarest's talk; deliberately provocative stands taken on subjects the younger man had taken for granted. A means of engaging his mind and testing his attitude. Inflexibility would have shown the man to be brittle and liable to break in an emergency. As it was the black-and-white presentations had helped to soften the monotony of the journey.
Angado said, "Earl, those reports you heard and that flash. On the night we landed."
"Yes?"
"I've never seen anything like them while I've been on watch. Have you?"
"No."
"Yet we're heading toward them. Why? They could have been a natural occurrence."
"I doubt it."
"But you can't be sure."
"No." Dumarest added, "We've talked enough. Will you take the first watch or shall I?"
"I'll take it."
Angado watched as Dumarest settled then turned to look at the surrounding emptiness. The rolling plain of featureless grass now silvered by starlight into a desert of snow, of frost, of uncaring indifference. Later, when tossing in restless sleep, he dreamed of lying on it forever, his skull grinning at the skies.
The next dawn it rained and they lunged forward through wet and hampering grass. Noon brought sun and thrusting winds. Night came with hunger and tormented rest. A pattern repeated with variations over the next three days. On the fourth they reached the end of the plain.
It ended abruptly as if a giant knife had slashed the terrain from side to side in a cut which reached from left to right as far as the eye could reach. A division which proved the plain to be the summit of a plateau rearing high above the ground below. Dumarest halted well clear of the edge, one ornamented with wheeling birds, graced with the susurration of wind.
"God!" Angado, more foolhardy, had dropped to thrust his head over the edge. Turning he waved. "Look at this, Earl! Look!"
From the edge the ground fell sharply in a precipitous slope broken by rocky outcroppings, clumps of vegetation, tufts of grass and clinging vines. An almost sheer surface ending in a mass of scree far below.
"A mile!" Angado drew in his breath. "We must be a mile high at least."
Rising, Dumarest shaded his eyes and studied the terrain beyond. An expanse of raw dirt, trees, rocks, stunted bushes ran to the far horizon. Nowhere could he see signs of habitation. The edge on which he stood could run in a ragged circle and to follow it would mean being trapped on the plain. To descend would be easy and it was important they choose the right place.
He checked the compass and again looked ahead seeing nothing more than before. The instrument could be faulty or distance had compounded small, initial errors. He looked at the sky. The sun was rising and wind droned against the cliff. A blast that carried seeds and dust, leaves and debris which spun as it rode the thermals, fluttering like broken fans.
Without the compass they would have wended toward the right and, for lack of checking sightings, they must have done just that.
"Left," he said to Angado. "We'll move left and hope to find something."
They spotted it at noon, a thread of smoke, a glitter which flashed and vanished from among a clump of trees.
Angado squinted at it, puzzled, shaking his head.
"I can't make it out. There're no houses that I can see and it certainly isn't a town. The smoke must be from an open fire-but the glitter?" He grunted as it came again and quickly vanished. "The sun reflected from a window? A mirror? What?"
"Water," said Dumarest. "That's a camp of some kind. They've got a bowl of water, washing in it, maybe." He checked the direction on the compass. "That's where we'll make for."
"Sure." Angado sat down, relief had brought a sudden weakness. "All we have to do is climb down this cliff."
Dumarest examined it again, finding the surface no different from what it had been before. He checked a probable line of descent; from the edge to an outcropping to where tufts of grass could provide a series of holds, to where a narrow ledge supported a clump of tall, bamboo-like vegetation.
Opening the packs, he sorted out the clothing, the ropes he had made.
"Weave more," he told Angado. "Make them tight and strong."
He set the pace, slicing the clothing with his knife, plaiting the strands, making sure they would hold. When the rope was long enough to reach the ledge he tied it around his waist.
"Hold it fast," he warned the younger man. "If I slip ram it against the ground with your foot and throw your weight against it. Keep it tight-too much slack could jerk you over when it tightens."
"What about the other stuff?" Angado looked at the discarded litter, the sacs and painfully carried items. "You dumping it?"
"This is just a test run. Hold fast now."
Dumarest slipped over the edge, feeling dirt crumble beneath his weight, dropping until his foot hit the rocks he had spotted. More dirt plumed down over him, grit stinging his eyes. Angado's face looked anxiously through a mist of dust.
"All right, Earl?"
"Get back! Watch that rope!"
His lifeline if he should slip but Angado's death together with his own if the man was careless. Dumarest waited then resumed the descent. Grass yielded beneath his weight to reveal crusted stone traced with roots. A second tuft held and he paused to examine the face of the cliff. It was rotten, eroded with wind and weather, turning to dust beneath his touch.
He inched lower, hoping that rock would provide a firmer surface, brushing aside the tall shoots as he reached the ledge bearing the bamboo. Tall poles a couple of inches thick covered with thorned leaves which dewed the back of his left hand with blood. Behind them, hidden by the foliage, gaped the open mouth of a cave.
Suddenly it filled with vicious life.
It came with a rush, a thing gleaming with chitin, mandibles open, faceted eyes reflecting the sun as if they had been rubies. A centipede-like insect three feet long nine inches thick, multiple legs covered with cruel spines which ripped and tore at Dumarest's arm as the mandibles reached to close on his throat.
Closing on his left forearm instead as he swung it up to block the attack.
The creature doubling to drive its sting into his face.
Dumarest felt the rasp of the body as he jerked his head aside, kicking so as to drive himself out and away from the ledge. Spinning, dropping, he reached for his knife, lifting it as the insect scrabbled at his arm, the sting slamming against his shoulder. Acid stung his cheek as he stabbed upward, the blade digging deep into the armored body. A blow with little result and he freed the knife and slashed instead, the keen edge cutting deep before the sting, crippling, cutting again to lop off the last few segments of the writhing body.
Hurt, maimed, the creature twisted, raking Dumarest with mandible and spines, then reared up to catch the rope and run up it. Halting, it began to tear at the plaited strands.
"Angado!" Once weakened, the rope would break and he would fall a mile to end as a bloody pulp on the scree. "Up, man! Up!"