"Seven wild orgs dived on the feast, and carried the seven eggs in different directions, all around Knife-in- the-Sky. The orgs hovered over the eggs, keeping them warm. When each egg hatched, it produced a boy and a girl, and two of every creature that is useful to a man.
"But the Watchers spied where the orgs had gone, all but one. One by one, they found the eggs just as they hatched, and devoured die hatchling creatures, and killed the orgs that guarded them.
"But the seventh org they did not kill. It flew out into the shadowworld, where Knife-in-the-Sky hides the flatworld from the Watchman's tower. Here the hatch- lings escaped. Green grass sprouted from the droppings of the creatures. The boy baby and the girl baby were nursed by the wild org that had saved them. They grew to be man and woman, and the parents of all our people.
"And what has come to me," Org Rider ended gravely, "is that one of the other eggs did in fact get safely away, and its hatchlings were the parents of Ben Yale Pertin!"
The giant was laughing boisterously. Org Rider paused. "What's the matter?" he demanded.
"What rot, boy!" Redlaw boomed. "Ignorant superstition!"
Org Rider leaped to his feet. "It is as my mother told it to me, Redlaw."
"It is nonsense," Redlaw insisted. "You should spend a few sleeps with the Watchers some time! You'll learn the difference between savage myths and scientific truths. I do not know whose superstitions are worse, yours or Ben Yale Pertin's."
"And what then is truth, all-knowing Redlaw?" the boy demanded stiffly.
"Ah, that I don't know," the giant confessed. "Some of the things Ben Yale Pertin says may have truth in them somewhere. He says our world may be hollow—"
"Hollow!" Org Rider cried scornfully.
"Yes. Does that seem unlikely? It does to me, too, and yet I know there are levels below. The tower of the Watchman guards one of the gates to those levels. I have been there while a captive of the Watchers, and I know. And there is some truth in what your mother told you, too, I think. There are such things as keepers and Watchers, and that is where they live. But—"
He was silent for a time, staring across the fire at the sleeping stranger. Then he stood up.
"It is time to sleep," he said, his voice hardening. "We are wasting time."
Fast and low, they kept going. They were halfway around the thrust of Knife-in-the-Sky's largest bastion, carried by Redlaw's driving purpose. For Org Rider that purpose seemed strange and remote; he could understand Redlaw's burning hatred of the Watchers, who had enslaved him and threatened his life; but now that they were free of the Watchers it seemed pointless to seek revenge. The boy himself was most occupied with his young org, who seemed to grow in size and intelligence and maturity with every breath. When Org Rider woke, the infant org was hopping unsteadily toward him, seeking not food—he was capable of finding his own well enough by then—but affection, the ritual rub- down of his golden fur with a handful of moss. Org Rider did not neglect the duties his mother had described to him. In particular he talked to the org, crooningly, repetitiously, and was rewarded by having Babe repeat some of the words to him. It was not rote replaying, like an earthly parrot's; it was almost like the first experimental use of language of a human child. The org's delicate high-pitched voice could repeat words like "food" when it was hungry, "sleep" when tired, and a dozen others. If it mangled some of the syllables, it nevertheless made itself clear.
Babe's stubby wings began to unfold as the boy groomed them. Tapered triangular fins, they had been molded invisibly into his sleek flanks. They looked almost too thick and too narrow to be useful in flight, but the boy's caressing fingers could feel their muscular power.
When they were fully spread, the boy determined to show Babe how they were used. He climbed a rock, the org hopping after him, spread his arms, and leaped toward another rock, flapping his arms.
To his surprise, Babe understood at once—so quickly that before Org Rider had reached his goal, Babe came sailing over him on quivering wings.
"Oh, good for you, Babe!" the boy shouted in delight. But the delight faded and congealed into panic, as the org kept going, past him and up, up over the sheltering leaves of the forest screen. He wheeled in a climbing spiral and screamed with a sound the boy had never heard him make.
Fear took the boy's breath. Was Babe calling to the wild orgs above the cliffs? He looked back to his companions for help; they were no help—Redlaw sound asleep under a mossy rock, Ben Yale Pertin watching apathetically. Without thinking, Org Rider crouched on the rock and kicked himself into the air, using every bit of strength in his legs and body, leaping a dozen times his own height, straight at the wheeling org.
Babe saw him and joyously dove to meet him. His young clumsiness made them collide, spinning the boy off balance, knocking the breath out of his body. But the org was up to the needs of the moment. Org Rider felt the velvet trunk coil around him protectingly. Strong and supple, it held him, then lifted him to the org's sleek-furred back, just above the rippling wings.
The boy lifted his voice in a shout of breathless triumph. "Now I am truly Org Rider!" he crowed. "Faster, Babe! Faster and higher!" And the org echoed in its piping voice: "Faster, Babe! Faster, faster!" Org Rider clung with his knees, fists locked in the golden fur, leaning against the wind of their flight. The throb of wings became a purr as Babe dived across the treetops, climbed again, then wheeled toward a clearing, so close above the yellow-bladed shrubs that the boy saw the giant moths fluttering about in terror. The boy's first alarm became a wild elation. His own wings had never lifted him with such speed or strength. He clapped the org's golden flank and called into the wind. "Good, Babe! Good!"
And the org piped happily, "Good Babe!" as it circled and dived again.
At last the boy found that Babe would respond to voice and tug of fists and kick of heels. Thoughtfully he drove the org back toward the clearing where the giant moths fluttered and cried, "Food, Babe! Eat! Get it!"
"Food Babe!" the org echoed, and showed its understanding by diving at one of the moths to catch it in spread talons. "Home Babe?" it piped questioningly, and Org Rider cried:
"Yes, Babe, home. We'll cook it and eat it. You've earned your food this time!"
They flew high, while the boy searched the flank of the mountain for the place where they had left Redlaw and Ben Yale Pertin. All the trees looked alike to him, all the clearings much the same. He caught a glimpse of something metallic, high above them on an outcropping, but it was not small enough to be Redlaw's cleaver or the stranger's peculiar instruments. He began to feel dismay . . . and then realized that Babe knew better than he; while he was searching the treetops for a clue, the org had already zeroed in on their campsite and was beating toward it powerfully.
When they landed, the boy got off his org's back and said solemnly, "Now I am truly Org Rider, and no longer a boy!"
Redlaw was staring at him with anger, and a touch of wry admiration. "No longer a boy, yes," he rumbled. "But a fool anyway! Listen, Org Rider who is no longer a boy. What do you hear?"
The boy, perplexed, stood still, ears tuned to—what? That distant shrill whistle?
"Do you hear it? Do you see it?" Redlaw demanded. "Over there—beyond the bee-tree. High in the sky!"
The boy looked. He had not heard it, because of the whistle of wind in his own ears, but now he heard it clearly and saw it, too, falling like a thick, blunt spear toward the slope of the mountain. A ship of the Watchers!
"If they saw you," Redlaw muttered, "then, man who is no longer a boy, you will not live to be a man very long."
The sputtering Pmal translator on Ben Yale Pertin's wrist caught only a few words, but they were enough to warn him. The Watchers were nearby.