TERRA!
An alternative name for Earth.
Navalok had been watching. He said, anxiously, "Earl, is anything wrong?"
"No." Dumarest took a deep breath and set down the chronometer. He could be reading too much into too little. The almost obliterated words could have meant something entirely different and, even assuming the last would have been the planet of origin, it need not have been Terra. And yet the chance existed and could not be ignored. "Do you have any more items like these?"
"Not here, Earl. There are Shrines in other Houses as I told you, but they are much the same."
And impossible to visit or examine. Dumarest knew of the jealous pride each Family maintained, the almost fanatical isolation they kept from each other. With time and money, perhaps, it could be done, but he had neither. And it might not be necessary. He remembered the boy's previous hesitation, his obvious reluctance to reveal information. A secret he could be hiding and one Dumarest had to know.
"A pity," he said, casually. "I'm interested in old things. It would be nice to find more of them somewhere. Are you interested in the past?"
Navalok blinked at the suddenness of the question.
"I-yes, Earl. I am."
"The old days," mused Dumarest. "When men landed to settle new worlds. Think of the challenges they had to face. The dangers they had to overcome. Each item of their equipment is a thing of veneration. Every scrap could tell us something new. If you knew where there were more of these things you could become an authority, Navalok. Your fame would spread and learned men come to consult you on their problems."
The wrong approach, the boy was not interested in academic distinction. Dumarest recognised it and said, "The House would be proud of you and you would earn the respect of the entire Family. Women would beg you to father their sons as they did the heroes of old." A shrewd guess but, Dumarest felt, a right one. He ended with a shrug. "Well, it would be nice, but unless such things can be found it must remain only a dream."
To press more would be to press too much, to arouse an antagonism or to wither their new-found friendship. For too long the boy had been rejected, used with cynical contempt, ignored. He had built up a layer of defense and, to threaten it, would be to turn trust into suspicion.
And the information, if he had it, would be a closely held secret.
Dumarest strolled from the opening, his face bland, a man who had seen all there was to see of any interest. As if by accident the gun fell from his pocket to clatter on the floor. He picked it up, turning it, bouncing it on his palm, conscious of the boy watching, the hunger in his eyes.
As he put the weapon out of sight Navalok blurted, "Earl, there is such a place. I know where more of these things are to be found."
Dumarest was deliberately obtuse. "A museum?"
"No. It's in the hills. I found it one day when my father took me out in a raft. I think he was looking for game. We landed and later I went exploring on the slope. I found a cave. The light was bad but I saw things like those." He gestured towards the objects littering the polished slab of the Shrine.
"And?"
"My father said it was an important discovery. He was going to report it but on the way back something went wrong. The raft crashed and he was killed and I-" He looked at his twisted foot. "I didn't say anything."
A child, hurt, bewildered, keeping the discovery to himself for reasons he couldn't have consciously known.
And now?
"I'll guide you if you promise to help me, Earl," he said in a rush. "If you'll teach me how to kill an olcept. If you'll help me to gain my trophy."
* * * * *
Dephine said, her voice edged with anger, "Earl, you're mad! Insane! The thing is ridiculous!"
He said nothing, watching as she paced the room with long strides, her hair a tumbled mane, her skin glistening with a moist warmth. She had just bathed and, as she walked, each step revealed the long, flowing line of her thighs through the slits in her robe.
"You can't do it, Earl!" She halted before him and he could smell the perfume she wore, the slightly sweet odor of decaying blooms. "You can't!"
"Why not?"
"Because it's dangerous, you fool, that's why. Men get killed hunting an olcept, women too, my own sister-well, never mind. But I don't want you hurt or killed, Earl. You mean too much to me for that."
He said, dryly, "Is that why you killed Galbrene?"
"Killed Galbrene?" She frowned. "I didn't kill him, Earl. He fell beneath your hands. Everyone saw it."
"They saw him fall," he corrected. "But I didn't kill him and we both know it. He was dazed when I made the final attack, dying where he stood. Didn't you think I could manage him?"
"Earl, you're wrong. I didn't touch him."
"Why bother to lie?"
"I'm not, Earl. I swear it!"
For a moment he held her eyes then his hands reached out, caught her own, lifted them so the gleaming nails pointed towards the ceiling. Beneath the curve of sharp metal on her right index finger he could see the tiny hole of a surgical implant; a narrow tube which had been buried in the flesh. The finger of her left hand held another. It spat a minute cloud of vapor as he squeezed the first joint, the nodule he discovered beneath the skin. On the ceiling a tiny dart hummed to vanish into the plaster.
An effective range of about ten feet, he decided, more if the target were unclothed. The dart would bury itself within the tissue by ultra-sonic vibration and be coated with a blood-soluble poison.
"An assassin's weapon," he said. "It goes well with the nails."
"One never used before, Earl. You can believe that."
"What difference if it has?"
"None." She rubbed at her hands then stared her defiance. "And what business of yours is it if I did? What I've done before we met is no concern of yours. As what you've done is no concern of mine. For me, Earl, life began when I met you. Real life, I mean, not the shallow searching for adventure that had gone before. I love you, Earl. Don't you understand that? I love you!"
"And you killed Galbrene to prove it?"
"I killed to save you and would do it again if I had to." Turning she swept across the room, knocking against a small table in her agitation, sending a delicate vase to shatter on the floor. "Galbrene had you. I thought he would break your back. The man was like an animal in his strength. Can you honestly say that you could have beaten him on level terms?" She didn't wait for an answer. "It was a chance I daren't take. You had moved close, were within range, all that remained was to make sure I hit the right one. Your attack covered his fall."
And protected her position. If nothing else Dumarest could appreciate the desire to survive which consumed her.
She shrugged as, dryly, he mentioned it.
"So I was thinking of myself a little too, Earl. Can I be blamed for that? You know what would have happened to me had you fallen. But you didn't fall and everything is fine now. So why are we arguing?" Her smile held invitation. "Surely there is something more entertaining we could do?"
The nails, the secret weapons, the smile, the turn of her hips and the sidelong glance, the allure she knew so well how to project. All the hallmarks of the accomplished courtesan and yet, as she had reminded him, what had her past to do with the present?
And, as she had also pointed out, who was he to judge? "Earl!"
She was close to him, the robe open now, the parting revealing the long, lissom lines of her body, the contours of which he knew so well. Why not just accept her as she was, to ride the tide of seductive passion to whatever shore might be waiting? "Earl?"