"Not much I can say except to keep looking. One thing, though, watch out for purple streaks in the rock. Set markers if you find any; purple is the sure sign of rich shale."
"Shale?" Vardoon frowned and shook his head. "Alamite, maybe, but never shale."
"Did I say shale?" The officer shrugged. "Well, keep at it and watch out for storms."
"A test," said Vardoon as the raft rose to hover in the sky. "We were being checked out, Earl, just as you suspected. Changes, eh? I wonder who the new holder is."
"Does it make any difference?"
"Not to us, but-" Vardoon shrugged. "Let's move if we're going to. It's getting late."
"They're watching us," said Dumarest. "So we'll stay for a while. Eat and look around. We won't move until they clear the sky."
For an hour they checked the load, lashing it firm before Dumarest sent the vehicle into the air and headed north to where a thin, pale smoke wreathed the distant hills.
He rode low, the ground streaming beneath them: arid soil tufted with sparse vegetation and littered with massive boulders. Once they passed over a cleared area on which grew a straggle of crops. Those working the land didn't raise their heads as the raft swept over them. The houses they lived in were beehives spiked with copper antennae.
Dumarest could guess who and what they were: criminals, debtors, the stranded and those who'd lost out. The unfortunate. The bottom of the heap. Each world solved its own problems but the solution was usually the same.
The terrain changed, became more rugged, a wilderness of bleak expanses split by narrow crevasses, the whole having the appearance of a battleground illuminated by transient gleams of reflected light.
"Idiot gems," said Vardoon as he stared over the side. He sat beside Dumarest, hands on the rail, body laced with the restraints which held them both. "Silica and other minerals fused into a composite mass. Pretty but not worth digging out."
"Is anything?"
"Sometimes you can find a chain of nuggets where lightning has burned away the dross. Alloys, too, and crudely refined metals. During the winter when it's calmer people come out to root around in search of artistic items: stuff fused and shaped into abstract designs. Some of it fetches high prices at market." He looked at the sun, the peaks ahead. "Best to hurry, Earl. We've got to settle well before dark."
This intention was threatened by the delay, for the winds slowed them. Turbulence caught the raft as it neared the edge of the soaring range, lifting it, sending it spinning up and toward seared and pitted stone. Dumarest regained control, riding high and clear before heading back toward the south.
Vardoon said, "Going back to try later?"
It had to be a day, at least-delay he couldn't afford. Not only for the expense but for those who might be too curious as to who and what he was. Sacaweena was a small world with a small population and not an easy place to remain inconspicuous.
The raft lowered as Dumarest swung in a circle. The sun was low, the ground darkening with growing shadows, the peaks bathed in a flood of carmine light. The slopes bore the black mouths of caverns edged and fretted with glistening silicates. Against the darkness they glowed with a dancing luminescence.
"Charged," muttered Vardoon. "Loaded and ready to go." His hands were tight on the rail. "Back off, Earl. Let's go while there's still time."
But time ran out as lightning blazed around them. A discharge left raft and men bathed and haloed with blue-green fire. A glare blinded Dumarest with a dazzle of afterimages. When he could see again he looked at death.
It stared from the hills, filled the air with invisible energies, waited in the distance they had been flung, the height. Heated air rose in a thermal which caught and spun the raft like a leaf in a storm. Fighting the controls, Dumarest rode the wind, managed to veer the raft from a ridge of jagged stone, felt the wrench as a swirling updraft lifted it, the sickening drop as it hit a pocket of less dense air.
Around him a giant stirred, breathing fire, smoke and flame.
"Earl! For-"
Thunder drowned the rest of Vardoon's cry, stabbed at unmuffled ears, seared their eyes again with savage fury. Far to one side a peak glowed and dripped steaming magma as again lightning flashed and again the giant roared, releasing energy which at any moment could turn the raft into falling debris, into smoking vapor.
Where to hide?
The instinct of an animal and Dumarest obeyed it. To find a hole in which to crouch while the storm raged outside. Protection to be gained only in the hills themselves.
As the glare died he saw the dark holes before him; the gaping mouths of caverns now ringed with darting flickers of miniature lightning. To judge which was large enough to take them was not enough-how to tell their depth?
The decision was made for him by a sudden gust of air which rose to tilt the raft and send it hurtling toward the pitted stone.
Dumarest felt the impact and used it even as he fought to maintain control. The raft tilted farther, seemed about to overturn, then straightened a little as, judging time and distance, he adjusted lift and drive. Close to the wall he found the reverse suction he had anticipated, used it, riding it to send the raft into the cavern which gaped before them. It came to rest with a juddering rasp of metal on stone.
"Close." Vardoon sucked in his breath as he looked at the hands he lifted from the rail, the bruises, the blood rimming the nails. "By God, that was close!"
Seventy feet away, beyond the mouth of the cave, thunder roared and reflected lightning illuminated the corpselike pallor of his face.
Chapter Six
Fatigue rode with Fiona despite the pills she had taken and it was hard to keep her shoulders straight, to smile and nod at banal greetings, to wear a cloak of assurance and pretend a satisfaction she could not feel, and that was all the more false now that the euphoria of combat had died to reveal the harsh reality.
"A near thing, my dear." Lobel, smiling, garish in bright hues too young for his seamed and cunning face, lifted a hand in greeting. "Too near for comfort but you handled it well."
"I won, Lobel."
"You survived," he corrected. "For that you are to be congratulated. The next time-" His shrug was expressive.
"The next time I shall regain all I have lost and more."
"Of course."
"And then you will need to come begging for my aid."
"Which I am sure you will not refuse." His smile was devoid of warmth; a grimace which bared teeth and gums in the semblance of a snarl. "Friends must stick together, my dear. Ah! I see Helm has arrived."
Fiona glared at his retreating back then smoothed her face before others could witness her anger. Lobel was no worse than most and she would do better to make friends than provide meat for enemies, Reed? No, he was bearing the marks of his bartering and what could you gain from a loser? Vanderburg? He stood talking to Myra Lancing, a tall, slim woman neat in red and black, who had raised her status more by accident than design and Fiona wondered what plots they might be hatching. From the far side of the table Prador caught her eye, smiled, lifted his glass as if in a toast.
A gesture she returned with her own.
"Bad times," he said as he joined her. "If it hadn't been for you taking the pressure, Fiona, I'd be ruined by now. Another drink?" He replaced her glass with one filled with a golden fluid. "Correo's out, did you know? Grard won't be able to withstand the slightest pressure and is looking for allies. Sylvia and Jeanne-you know them?"
"Dulet and Wendling? Not intimately."
"They recently inherited and formed an alliance. The basic plan was for mutual aid in the event of any attack but Sylvia relies on intuition and Jeanne is basically a gambler. If they ever had to face real pressure they would crack apart." He paused, waiting for her comment, adding, as she remained silent, "A thought, my dear, one to bear in mind. When the giants get hungry we small people must take what steps we can."