"What are you going to do with that?" Lycon demanded.
N'Sumu stared at him impassively. "Why, take it back to my apartments and eat it."
"Eat it!" Vonones gasped.
"Of course. Why else would my people hunt sauropitheci? They are delicious when prepared with a sauce of pepper, lovage, caraway, laser, honey, pine nuts…"
"But the thing has fed on human flesh!" Vonones protested.
N'Sumu favored them with his widest smile, and left them standing uneasily in Vonones' office.
After a moment Lycon swore and lowered himself painfully onto a bench. "The Superintendent of Sewers," he said in a tired voice, "once told me they'd been working on the lines ever since there was a city here-six hundred years, eight hundred, depends on who you talk to. He thought I ought to go hunting for some of the rats his crews found. Said they'd do just fine in the arena, fighting leopards and the like. I finally decided he wasn't joking."
"Look," said Vonones. "I can see to getting the men and the dogs and whatever nets and weapons we'll need. It's going to be several hours at best before we can move. Why don't you get cleaned up and catch a few hours of sleep? You aren't in any shape to net peacocks, let alone go following hounds through miles of sewers after a creature that… well, things aren't going to get better if we do manage to corner it."
"Things will sure as hell get worse if we don't," Lycon pointed out. "And anyway, when did you last get some sleep?"
"I haven't been wrestling with lizard-apes in public fountains," Vonones told him. "And you really should get those wounds looked after-that hand looks like a lump of raw liver. Come on, Lycon-if you're too exhausted to chase this thing down, you know none of the rest of us are up to the job. And if we fail, then we are all of us…"
"All right," Lycon yawned, too fatigued to argue further. "I'll go to the baths, get cleaned up and have a good rubdown, maybe sleep a few hours until we're ready to move."
"And take my litter," Vonones urged. "No, don't argue. It will save time all around, and you can nap on the way. I'll be busy here, and I'll send a messenger for you as soon as you're going to be needed. Might even stretch out for a short nap myself." The last was a lie, but the dealer wanted Lycon to get some rest at any cost.
"All right," decided Lycon. "I said I'd go." A memory stirred in his tired consciousness. "I'll be at the Baths of Naevius-that's not far from here, is it?"
He paused, not wanting to voice his thoughts. "Vonones, what do you think of N'Sumu?"
"I've known," said Vonones, and hesitated. Then: "I've known of people who claimed to be magicians."
"I've known of people who were magicians," Lycon stated in what was not precise agreement. "Still, I never knew a magician who did what N'Sumu did with his hands-not just by touching people, but at a distance."
Vonones bit his lip. "I don't believe in the gods, Lycon," he said, with his face twisted in a frown of concern. "Not like that, but…"
"Let's just pray that N'Sumu is a friendly god-or magician," Lycon said. "At least, friendlier toward us than toward the lizard-ape."
Chapter Seventeen
N'Sumu rented a suite of rooms on the second floor of an apartment block in rather a better neighborhood than that of last night's conflagration. The block included another thirty or so similar apartment suites, most of them broken up and sublet to other tenants. That the strange Egyptian was wealthy enough to occupy an entire suite of rooms by himself did not excite half as much curiosity as did the scandal that N'Sumu lived there without a single slave to serve him-at least, none had ever been observed to enter or depart, although at times questionable sounds were to be heard from within the Egyptian's chambers.
There was a window overlooking the courtyard, but it seemed to be masked with some sort of curtain, and no one could catch any glimpse of what was within even when the shutters were open. This was not surprising, since the screen that blocked out this sun's dangerous ultraviolet radiation also insured complete privacy from any human range of vision. Another field had been calibrated to trigger sensations of fear and unease in any human who approached too closely. If this would not discourage a potential intruder, there were other measures inside the apartment that would terminate any unwelcome visit. N'Sumu had returned one night to find the corpse of a thief, obviously one who had been too drunken to react to artificially induced fear but not so drunken that he could not reach the window. The body lay broken upon the stones of the courtyard, and when the other tenants assumed that the thief had slipped and fallen,N'Sumu did not disabuse them.
N'Sumu unlocked the door of his apartment with the cumbersome key he had been given-after first disarming his own security system by means of one of the devices from the belt he wore beneath his tunics. Once inside, he reactivated all systems. Heretofore his concerns were limited to the chance intrusions and prying curiosity of this world's aboriginal populace; since the night past he now harbored a very real dread in the form of a blue-scaled killer that now had sensed the presence here of its original captor. The situation on this assignment was definitely deteriorating.
RyRelee-or N'Sumu, as he was known to the natives of this world-dropped the corpse of the phile hatchling onto the floor of the barely furnished room and began to pull off the stifling folds of his native clothing. That accomplished, the emissary stripped off the most accessible portions of the bronze-colored protective sheathing he wore over his natural scales-sheathing both a disguise and a protection from the deadly ultraviolet radiation of this scalding hot planet. Carefully he removed the major segments of the mask that enclosed his head. He dared not attempt to make himself any less uncomfortable, as it would take too long to reassemble all of his cosmetic features, and RyRelee had too much to do before he rejoined his native helpers.
The emissary considered them. Their cooperation seemed to be as necessary as it was frustrating. It wasn't that they blundered badly, the two of them. On the contrary, their competence and the way they chose to apply it were dangerous to RyRelee's plans. That was the problem, after alclass="underline" they made choices instead of doing as they were told, the way Class 6 natives ought to do when given orders by a civilized life form. The plump one, Vonones-he seemed to be soft and safe enough to deal with, but RyRelee had witnessed the aborigine's courage, and he now recognized the shrewd cunning behind the merchant's overt attempts to be conciliatory at all times. The other, Lycon, too often reminded the emissary of a phile; this native was competent, ruthless-and too dangerous for RyRelee's comfort.