Melome said, "Earl, I'm cold. You're flying too high and I'm cold."
Dumarest turned from the controls and looked at her. She sat huddled in the body of the raft, small, pale in the starlight, knees drawn up to her chest, arms wrapped around her body. Her eyes followed him as he rose and came close.
"Cold? But the night is warm."
"I'm still cold." Her tone was petulant. "Look if you don't believe me." She held out an arm and he could see the goose-pimples marring the smoothness. She shivered a little as he touched her. "Please! Can't we go lower?"
"We aren't that high."
"Then land and build a fire or something. I'm freezing!"
Landing would waste time and to build a fire would be to advertise where they were. Did she want that? Dumarest touched her again and felt the chill of her skin. To one side lay the clown's disguise he had discarded and he lifted the fabric and wrapped it around her slim body.
"It won't be long," he soothed. "Once we hit the town I'll buy you some hot food and some new clothes. Gems too if you want them. Just be patient."
"I'm still cold."
A child or a stubborn young girl. It was hard to tell for even if the body matured the mind still retained its youth. Yet she seemed mentally alert and he guessed she wanted to exercise her power. To reassure herself that she held some measure of dominance. An attitude he encouraged; to beat her down would be to lose her cooperation.
Beneath him the raft tilted a little and he adjusted the controls, leveling it against the thrust of a vagrant wind. Rising he tried for clearer air and looked behind as the altitude increased. If there was pursuit it was invisible; the rafts riding without lights and staying low so as not to occlude the stars. A fault he was making but he was unfamiliar with the terrain and to ride too low was to invite destruction.
"Earl!"
"All right, Melome. We're going down."
The upper regions held chill winds which held an edge and he dropped the raft to its former level. Hunched in the clown's disguise the girl remained silent and, struck by a sudden suspicion, Dumarest went to kneel beside her.
"Listen to me," he said. "Do you feel ill? Odd? In any kind of pain?"
"I'm just cold."
"Did Shakira ever tell you what would happen to you if you ran away? Did he?"
"No."
"Be honest now."
"I told you. Tayu was good to me. Better than that bitch Kamala. Better than you-he didn't make me freeze."
"It won't be for long."
Dumarest frowned as he returned to the controls. He'd gambled that Shakira's threat had been a bluff and it seemed he'd guessed right. The girl was further proof; if anything, the owner would have safeguarded his property but apparently he'd made no effort to hold her. Nor to follow her; even if rafts had raced ahead to town they would have no idea from which direction he'd arrive.
And yet it seemed too easy.
The raft tilted again and he evened its flight. Below, silvered by the starlight, he could see massed vegetation broken by rearing outcrops of stone. Jagged masses which could rip the bottom from the raft if they dropped too low and he lifted the vehicle to allow for any sudden change in the terrain.
"Earl! Can't we land? Walk around for a while?"
A good suggestion if the girl was really cold but not if she was hoping for rescue. Dumarest looked at the stars but failed to gain a clear direction. The points were too many and he had taken an erratic course since leaving the circus. The wise course would be to rise high in order to spot the lights of the town. To delay too long would be to risk missing it altogether.
"Hold tight," he said. "We're going up."
"Earl!"
He ignored the protest as he sent the raft rising toward the stars. Up, beyond the layer of chill winds, higher to where the air stung like knives, higher still as breath plumed from his lips and, behind him, the girl wailed her anguish.
And still he couldn't spot the town.
Something was wrong and he sensed it as he lowered the vehicle. The distance between circus and town wasn't all that great and with the distance he had covered and the altitude he'd gained the lights should have been visible. Instead he'd seen nothing but endless, silvered darkness.
Crouching, he fingered the wires behind the control panel, touching the steering control, the direction indicator. A simple gyro-compass but one which seemed to have unusual additions. He jerked free a wire and watched as the needle kicked across the dial.
From where she sat Melome said, "Is something wrong?"
"No."
A lie- Shakira had been smarter than he'd thought. The controls had been tampered with and, instead of heading toward safety, the raft had swung in a wide circle and was now level with or behind the circus. Dumarest sent it wheeling toward the left, straightened as he watched the needle, fed power to the engines as the vehicle cut through the air. A velocity increased as he tilted the nose, gaining the pull of gravity in a long, downward slope. One reversed as the silvered darkness came too close. An extended seesaw motion which would baffle any observer.
Melome whimpered as the air tore at her hair, the covering she held wrapped tightly around her.
"Lie down," snapped Dumarest. "Roll against the side and keep below the rail. You'll feel warmer out of the wind."
But the wind increased to a whining drone as he fought for speed to cover distance. To rise again as the ground loomed beneath him, to reach his apex, to dive again toward the rock-studded vegetation.
To double in agony as it came close.
The pain was a fire tearing at nerve and mind and sinew. One which struck without warning to blur his vision and turn the world into a hell of screaming torment. Dumarest sank, quivering, sweat dewing face and neck and body with a liquid film. A time in which he was helpless, conscious only of the agony which dominated every cell of his body.
Then, as Melome screamed, it eased to vanish as quickly as it had come.
"Earl! Earl!"
The raft leveled as he grabbed at the controls, juddering, metal grating from one side as it glanced off an upthrusting finger of stone. Then it was riding clear and Dumarest gasped for breath, tasting blood, aware of the jerking quiver of his hands.
The pain had gone-but why had it come at all?
Shakira?
He had gambled the owner had been bluffing-had he lost the wager?
For a long moment Dumarest kept the raft riding scant yards above the ground, eyes narrowed as he followed a clear path. Distance covered while he gained time to think and then, again without warning, the agony returned.
To send him doubled, writhing, the raft slewing to one side, the nose lowering to hit the ground, the rock half-buried within it.
CHAPTER TEN
There were rustles and squeaks and small scampering noises as rodents foraged in the vegetation. Sounds as harmless as the wind but which caused Melome to quiver in fear. Like most who clung to urban places, for her the open at night was filled with imagined terrors.
"It's nothing," said Dumarest. "Just the wind and creatures hunting for food. Small creatures," he added quickly. "Things like mice. There's nothing big or harmful on Baatz."
"How can you be so sure?"
"It's the air. It leads to pacifism. A predator needs to stalk and kill in order to survive. It can't do that if it just wants to lie down and dream."
A facile explanation but it had elements of truth and Melome relaxed, leaning back to look at the sky.
"I'm not used to the open. It's too big, too empty. You could get lost and wander and starve and die and no one would ever know." She shivered a little. "And it's cold."
The truth-the air held a pre-dawn chill. Dumarest paused in his task of gathering twigs and rose, stretching. Behind him the raft lay on its side, the nose crumpled, the controls useless. They had been lucky. The impact had flung them from the open body to land on cushioning fronds and, aside from minor bruising, neither was hurt.