Hozman moved away, his lips curling in a smile of contempt. The Kash Blue-worm stopped short and thrust forward his face. "Do you dare to mock me? Am I ludicrous?"
Baba sprang forward. "No combat in here, never in the common room! "
The Kash swung his arm in a backhanded blow, knocking Hozman to the floor, at which Baba brought forth a cudgel and with amazing dexterity drove the Kash cursing and lumbering from the inn. Ifness solicitously reached to help Hozman to his feet. He glanced at Etzwane. "Your knife, to cut off a growth."
Etzwane jumped forward. Ifness held aside Hozman's maroon scarf; Etzwane slashed the straps of the little harness, while Hozman lay thrashing and kicking. The innkeeper gaped in amazement, unable to wield his cudgel. With his nose wrinkled in distaste Ifness lifted the asutra, a flattened creature marked with faint brown and maroon stripes. Etzwane slashed the nerve and Hozman emitted the most appalling scream yet heard in the inn at Shagfe. A hard, strong shape struck between Ifness and Etzwane: the Ka. Etzwane raised his knife, ready to stab, but the Ka was already gone with the asutra and out into the yard. Ifness ran in pursuit, with Etzwane close behind. They came upon a macabre scene, indistinct in swirls of boiling dust. The Ka, talons protruding from its feet, stamped upon the asutra and tore it to shreds.
Ifness, putting away his energy gun, stood grimly watching. Etzwane said in astonishment, "It hates the asutra more than we do."
"A curious exhibition," Ifness agreed.
From within the inn came a new outcry and the thud of blows. Clutching his head, Hozman ran frantically out into the yard, with the Alula in pursuit. Ifness, moving with unusual haste, intervened and waved off the Alula. "Are you totally without foresight? If you kill this man we will learn nothing."
"What is there to learn? " roared Karazan. "He has sold our daughters into slavery; he says we will never see them again."
"Why not learn the details?" Ifness turned to where Etzwane prevented Hozman from flight. "You have much to tell us."
"What can I tell you?" said Hozman. "Why should I trouble myself? They will tear me apart like the cannibals they are."
"I am nevertheless curious. You may tell your story."
"It is a dream," mumbled Hozman. "I rode through the air like a gray ghost, I spoke with monsters; I am a creature alive and dead."
"First of all," said Ifness, "where are the people you stole last night?"
Hozman threw his arm up in an unrestrained gesture which suggested imprecision in his thinking processes. "Beyond the sky! They are gone forever. No one returns after the car drops down;"
"Ah, I see. They have been taken into an aircraft."
"Better to say that they are gone from the world Durdane."
"And when does the car drop down?"
Hozman looked furtively aside, with his mouth pinched into a crafty knot. Ifness spoke sharply, "No temporizing! The Alula are waiting to torture you and we must not inconvenience them."
Hozman gave a hoarse laugh. "What do I care for torture? I know I must die by pain; so I was told by my witch-uncle. Kill me any way you like; I have no preference."
"How long have you carried the asutra?"
'It has been so long I have forgotten my old life.… When? Ten years ago, twenty years. They looked into my tent, two men in black garments; they were no men of Caraz, nor men of Durdane. I rose to meet them in fear, and they put the mentor upon me. " Hozman felt his neck with trembling fingers. He looked sidelong toward the Alula, who stood attentive, hands at the hilts of their scimitars.
"Where are the four you stole from us? " asked Karazan.
"They are gone to a far world. You are curious as to what is to be their lot? I cannot say. The mentor told me nothing."
Ifness made a sign to Karazan and spoke in an easy voice, "The mentor was able to communicate with you?"
Hozman's eyes became unfocused, words began to gush from his mouth. "It is a condition impossible to describe. When I first discovered the creature I went crazy with revulsion-but only for a moment! It performed what I call a pleasure-trick, and I became flooded with joy. The dreary Balch swamp seemed to swim with delightful odors, and I was a man transformed. There was at that moment nothing which I could not have accomplished! " Hozman threw his arms to the sky. "The mood lasted several minutes, and then the men in black returned and made me aware of my duties. I obeyed, for I quickly learned the penalty of disobedience; the mentor could bless with joy or punish with pain. It knew the language of men but could not speak except in a hiss and a whistle, which I never learned. But I could talk aloud and ask if such a course fulfilled its wishes. The mentor became my soul, closer to me than hands and feet, for its nerves led to my nerves. It was alert to my welfare and never forced me to work in rain or cold. And I never hungered, for my work was rewarded with ingots of good gold and copper and sometimes steel."
"And what were your duties? " asked Ifness.
Hozman's flow of words was again stimulated, as if they had long been pent inside of him, building a pressure to be released. "They were simple. I bought prime slaves, as many as could be had. I worked as a slave-taker, and I have scoured the face of Caraz, from the Azur River in the east to the vast Dulgov in the west, and as far south as Mount Thruska. Thousands of slaves have I sent into space! "
"How did you so send them?"
"At night, when no one was near and the mentor could warn me of danger, I called down the little car and loaded aboard my slaves, which first I had drugged into a happy stupor: sometimes only one or two, again as many as a dozen or even more. If I chose, the car would take me where I wished to go, quickly through the night, as from the Orgai to Shagfe village."
"And where did the car take the slaves?"
Hozman pointed into the sky. "Above hangs a depot hull, where the slaves lie quiet. When the hull is full it flies away to the mentor's world, which lies somewhere in the coils of Histhorbo the Snake. So much I learned to my idle amusement one starry night when I asked my mentor many questions, which it answered by a yes or a no. Why did it need so many slaves? Because its previous creatures were inadequate and insubordinate, and because it feared a terrible enemy, somewhere off among the stars. " Hozman fell silent. The Alula had drawn close to surround him; they now regarded him less with hate than with awe for the weird travail he had undergone.
Ifness asked in his most casual voice, "And how do you call down the little car?"
Hozman licked his lips and looked off over the plain. Ifness said gently, "Never again will you carry the asutra which brought such bliss to your brain. You are now one with the rest of us, and we consider the asutra our enemies."
Hozman said sullenly, 'In my pouch I carry a box with a little button within. When I require the car, I go out into the dark night and push on the button and hold it so until the car comes down."
"Who drives the car?"
"The device works by a mysterious will of its own."
"Give me the box with the button."
Hozman slowly drew forth the box, which Ifness took into his own possession. Etzwane, at a glance and a nod from Ifness, searched Hozman's pouch and person, but found only three small ingots of copper and a magnificent steel dagger with a handle of carved white glass.