‘Slow down, Weis,” Jensen said quietly from his seat next to the burly pilot. “There’s no rush. The weather’s worsening. We can finish the survey tomorrow.”
“I wanted to finish scanning this sector before heading back to the settlement,” muttered the other, banking sharply to the left to compensate as a gust of wind caught their scouter side-on.
Moments later, like a cork from a bottle, they shot out of the small valley into the plains, only to be caught again by the swirling blizzard.
This time, Jensen was flung back against his seat as Weis fought the controls, trying to force their craft back on course.
“What’s ahead?” Weis demanded. “How close are the Splitback Mountains?”
“Too damn close,” said Jensen, forcing himself up against the gees so he could reach his console and check their erratic course against what they had charted of the landscape below and around them. No point looking out the windscreen; all they could see was the swirling white-out of the storm. “We need to get above this weather and head back now, Weis.”
Weis snorted. “Yeah, right. Like I’m not trying! I wanna get off this dirt ball and back into space even if you don’t!”
“Pull up! Now! Starboard!” Jensen said urgently as the mountains suddenly loomed closer on his nav screen.
Again Weis yanked on the controls, banking sharply to the right as he pulled the small craft’s nose up.
Engines whining as the hull creaked and groaned in protest, Jensen clutched the armrests and, against all reason, willed the small scouter upwards while mentally trying to hold the hull together. He didn’t need to hear Weis’s low, repetitive swearing or the sudden blaring of the proximity alert to know they were in real trouble.
Then, with a shriek of tortured metal, Jensen felt the scouter grasped as if by a giant hand and flung against the mountainside.
Consciousness returned by degrees, but he had no inclination to move. Some sixth sense told him if he did, he’d discover that every part of his body hurt. Besides, he was comfortable right now, and his insulated flight suit was keeping him warm. Then something tickled his nose. He wriggled it, trying to dislodge whatever it was, but the tickling persisted. Reluctantly, he raised his arm to brush it away, but his hand only flopped unresponsively against his face.
Shock surged through him then as he remembered the crash. He struggled to sit up, panicking when he found he couldn’t. It was only as he opened his eyes and realized that the scouter was lying canted to one side that, with an effort of will, he sat still.
Now fully conscious, he began to take stock of his surroundings. His seat had semi-reclined into the crash position and the harness was all that was holding him there, and yes, every muscle in his body ached as if he’d been pummeled, but there was no sign of blood on his white winter fatigues. So far, so good. Now for his hands.
Lifting them up, he peered at them through half-closed eyes, expecting the worst, relieved when he saw they were unhurt, just numbed by the cold.
He turned his head, looking for Weis. The pilot lay inert in his seat, either out cold or dead, he’d no idea which. Almost subconsciously he noticed there was no blood visible on him either.
“Weis?” His voice cracked as he tried to call out. Licking his lips, he tried again, only to have his words swept away by the wind.
Wind? Inside the scouter? He frowned, confused, trying to make sense of what was happening. Then, beyond Weis, where the port hull had been, he saw the open gash. Through it, the blizzard was howling, coating everything in a layer of snow.
He wrapped the harness round one arm, and with his other hand he began hitting the harness’s release stud. It took several attempts, his numb hand being as much of a hindrance as an advantage because he felt no pain… yet. Finally it gave, and as he began to slide out of his seat toward the main console, he was able to check himself.
Turning round and grabbing hold of his chair arm as well, he hauled himself up until he got a foothold on the side of the console between the two seats. Then he reached for his pilot.
Beneath a frosting of snow, Weis’s face had a bluish-white tinge that was far from healthy. Reaching out to grasp him by the front of his padded flight suit, he noticed his own hand was the same bloodless color.
“Weis! Wake up! We crashed.”
The other began to move sluggishly, his hand going up automatically to brush the snow off his face before his eyes even opened. Jensen let him go, squatting back on his heels.
“What…” Weis groaned and began to move.
“We crashed,” said Jensen, slithering off his perch and down to the main console.
Hitting the emergency beacon, he prayed that the backup power unit hadn’t taken any damage.
Weis sniffed audibly, then, hitting his release buckle, catapulted himself out of his seat into Jensen, sending them both flying against the starboard bulkhead.
“Fuel,” he said succinctly, scrambling to his feet and reaching down to haul Jensen up by the collar. “Tank’s gone. We gotta get outta here.”
“Damnit, Weis…” Jensen staggered as Weis released him, biting back a groan of pain as he rubbed the back of his head.
“She could go up like a torch any minute. Can’t you smell the goddamn fumes?” Weiss demanded, grasping the dangling harness and pulling himself up onto Jensen’s seat, then onto his own.
Jensen followed, trying to ignore the pounding headache and the pain in his hands now that the circulation was finally returning to them. Snow made the surfaces slick and he slipped more than once, but finally he made it to the gash in the hull through which Weis had disappeared.
Grasping hold of the rough edges, he yelped in pain as the bitterly cold metal burned into his hand. Pulling free hurt even more. Dazed from this fresh pain, he stood watching as the blood welled up from the torn flesh into the hollow of his palm.
“You retard! Why didn’t you put your gloves on first like I did?” Weis demanded, hauling him bodily from the crashed scouter out into the darkening night and the full force of the blizzard.
“The ship’s not going to blow!” Jensen yelled, staggering through the deep snow in Weis’s wake as he was hauled along. “We must have been unconscious for over an hour!”
Weis said nothing, only increased his pace until they rounded a snow-covered rocky outcrop that offered some protection from the worst of the blizzard; then he stopped.
Jensen jerked himself free, and, unfastening one of his thigh pockets, reached inside for a field dressing. The wind had dropped and he could actually hear himself think.
“Give it here,” Weis snarled, looming over him and snatching the pack. Moments later, the dressing had been slapped over his palm and hastily tied in place. “Now put your headgear and gloves on! Didn’t the Company teach you tekkies nuthin’ about survival out here?”
The analgesic in the dressing hit his system almost instantly, bringing relief from the pain and sealing the wound. From his other pocket, he drew out his gloves and face mask.
He was angry, bloody angry if truth were told, at the way Weis had been treating him right from the moment they’d taken off from the valley settlement.
“Yeah, they taught me,” he said, fitting on the earpiece and mic set, then the face mask. Activating the mic, he reached behind his head for the hood, pulled it up, and secured it, then turned his attention to easing his hands painfully into the mitts.
“But they didn’t teach me how to survive a kamikaze pilot and being thrown against a bulkhead and landed on by him!” he added when he heard the click of Weis’s mic going live.
Weis’s laughter nearly deafened him, and the slap on his back sent him sprawling into the outcrop.
“You’re OK, Jensen.” he said, throwing him the end of a piece of fine rope. “Here, tie that ’round you and let’s get moving before the shuttle blows. I wanna reach those caves we scanned in the valley just before we crashed. We can hunker down there till the storm passes, then signal the Deigon for a pickup.”
Jensen stopped dead in the middle of tying the rope and looked up. Toggling his goggles to infravision, he shoved his hood back.
“What the hell you doin’, man?” Weiss demanded.
“Shut up. I heard something.”
“You heard something? You heard the…”
“I said shut the hell up!” Jensen snarled, moving a few feet away from him, back around the outcrop. He had heard something, and now he was scanning the white-speckled swirling darkness for a clue to what it was.
His hearing was legendary on the Deigon-he could hear a dog whistle as easily as any dog.
“There it is again,” he muttered, swinging around to face the direction they’d come from. It was high-pitched-had to be to carry over the banshee howling of the wind-and like nothing he’d ever heard before as it rose and fell in pitch before stopping abruptly. It came again, this time only a short burst, and from the opposite direction.
A flicker of red at the edge of his sight drew his attention back to the direction in which the shuttle lay. He grabbed hold of Weis’s arm, shaking him.
“Look! Over where the shuttle is!” he said. “Movement!”
“Can’t see a damned thing in this blizzard,” said the other. “Let’s get moving now before the shuttle…”
The ground beneath their feet began to tremble, gently at first, then more violently as a plume of flame even Weis could see erupted high in the night sky. Just as suddenly, it was gone, and as the mountain under them heaved and bucked, they were tossed to the ground like unwanted children’s toys.
Jensen lay there, arms cradled over his head, even though he knew it would be no protection.
“This region isn’t volcanic,” he muttered, more to himself than Weis.
“Tell the goddamn mountain that!”
The ground beneath them gave one last heave, then was still. Slowly he moved his arms and pushed himself into a kneeling position.
“Tell me there was enough fuel on the scouter to cause that,” he said, turning to watch as Weiss scrambled up.
“I can’t, and you know it.”
He got to his feet, dusting the snow off his flight suit and pulling his hood back up. “I’m going back to look at the scouter.”
“You’re mad,” said Weis. “You’ll not catch me goin’ back there after that!”
“Then wait here,” he snapped, losing patience with the burly pilot.
“Jensen, don’t go,” said Weis grabbing him by the arm. “Some things it’s better to ignore.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” he demanded.
The large man hesitated. “The locals were saying the mountain’s haunted.”
He snorted derisively. “And you believed them?”
“You said you heard somethin’, saw movements before she blew!”
“I didn’t see ghosts!” Then it came to him, what his subconscious had been trying to tell him for the last five minutes. “Whales! It sounded like whales.”
“Now who’s talking rubbish? Weis demanded. “There’s no whales five thousand feet up a mountain!”
Ignoring him, Jensen set off back the way they’d come. There was a mystery here and he aimed to solve it. As soon as he stepped out from the shelter of the outcrop, the wind howled around him, grabbing at him, trying to thrust him back. Doggedly he pushed on, keeping his head down, putting one foot in front of the other, following the tracks they’d left.
“Jensen, damnit! Come back! You can’t go off on your own in this weather! You didn’t even tie the rope round you!”
Jensen had reached the crash site before Weis caught up with him.
“Jesus Christ,” said Weis reverently as he came to an abrupt stop beside him. “The mountain ate it!”
Where the scouter had been was a ridge of bare rock some fifty feet long and as tall as a man. Of their craft, nothing remained.
Not a superstitious man by nature, even he was shaken by the sight before them. “I see it,” whispered Jensen, taking a tentative step forward. Something lying in the newly fallen snow, glowing faintly, caught his eye and he stopped to pick it up.
As he did, he heard the call again, this time a longer and more plaintive cry that got rapidly louder. Grabbing the object, he stood up in time to see something rushing toward him out of the night.
Weis yelled out a warning and dove for him as he stood rooted to the spot, staring in disbelief at the almost invisible shape hurtling toward him. At the last moment, it veered to one side. His cheek was brushed by something soft yet bitterly cold moments before Weis catapulted into him, knocking him back against the mountainside.
The call sounded again, urgent this time, and from the opposite direction. He’d no sooner swung his head to the right than he heard it answered from the one on his left-both sounded very close by. Looking wildly from side to side, Jensen tried to pinpoint their locations. From the one that had come at him, he’d gotten the impression they were human-sized, but what he saw was insubstantial-they had no visible heat source.
He flicked his goggles back to normal sight. Now he could see something-a pale fluttering shape within the swirling snow… No, two, they were together! They were silent now, but he could sense an urgency in their movements as they seemed to edge closer to them.
“What the hell’s going on?” demanded Weis, breaking his concentration. “What came at you?”
He pushed himself away from the rock face. “We have to leave!” he said.
“I’m not moving till I know what’s out there, and neither are you!” said Weis, pulling him back with one hand while waving his pistol menacingly in an arc in front of them.
“Put the goddamn gun away,” snarled Jensen, hitting Weis’s arm down. “Whatever it is, it isn’t dangerous to us! If it was, we’d be dead already.”
They called out again, sharp, plaintive bursts of sound as they fluttered closer then backed off again as if afraid to get too close.
“They know what a gun is,” Jensen murmured.
“I can’t see a thing in this blizzard,” snarled Weis.
“We have to leave, Weis,” he said again as behind him, the rock began to tremble slightly. In the distance, he heard a sharp crack followed by a dull rumbling that rapidly began to get louder.
“Avalanche!” he yelled, looking up as he tried to pull away from Weis.
***
With a shout of terror, Jensen sat bolt upright, gasping for breath. It was pitch black, and he could hear his heart beating loudly. Sweat began to run down between his shoulder blades, coating his body in a slick film, making his T-shirt stick uncomfortably to his back.
Reason told him if he could sit up, he wasn’t still buried under the avalanche, but reason had little to do with the nightmare of being buried alive that he relived each night.
The light flicked on, making him blink owlishly.
“Another nightmare?” asked a sympathetic feminine voice. “That’s the third this week. Want me to get you something to help you sleep?”
“No,” he said, rubbing shaking hands over his face and through his sweat-soaked hair, pushing it back from his eyes and forehead. Tonight’s dream was proving more difficult to shake off. “I’m fine. Just leave the main light on.”
“You know I can’t do that,” she said regretfully, stepping into the room. “Power is still rationed in Landing, but I have brought you a spare bedside lamp. It runs off a small atomic cell.”
He glanced up at her as she walked across to his bedside and placed the lamp on his night table.
“Touch the base to turn it off or on,” she said, demonstrating before turning to check that his left leg was still held firmly in the traction unit.
He lay back among his pillows, watching her. Something was different tonight.
“Tell me again how you found us,” he said abruptly.
Keeping her back to him, she gave a small laugh as she busied herself tucking the blankets around his uninjured right leg.
“I tell you this every night. We picked up the signal from your scouter before it exploded, and a party of the men went out to rescue you. You were extremely lucky, you know. There was a ledge just above you that took the brunt of the avalanche. You were only buried under a few feet of soft snow, and somehow you’d managed to push an air hole up to the surface.”
Her laugh sounded forced, unnatural.
“How’s Weis? When can I see him?”
She said nothing at first, just finished straightening the bed. “You need to sleep, Jensen, otherwise your leg will take longer to heal.”
Straightening up, she turned to face him, a bright smile on her lips. “We’ll talk about that tomorrow, shall we? Once you’re rested.”
“What’s happened to him? I want to know now!”
She hesitated, the smile fading. “It seems the blow to Weis’s head was more severe than we thought at first. I’m afraid he died a few hours ago.”
“What?” He sat up again, staring at her, hardly able to believe what he was hearing. “But you said he was fine…”
“It was very sudden,” she said, turning to leave. “Dr Kingston will be in to see you again tomorrow. He can answer all your questions.”
“I want to know now!”
“In the morning,” she said firmly, turning out the light and closing the door behind her.
“Damnit!” he snarled, reaching for the lamp and hitting the base to turn it on. It wasn’t bright, but it did push back the darkness immediately around his bed.
Why had the Company left them on Kogarashi instead of taking them back to the Deigon to be treated? None of the colonists had wanted them there; in fact, once they knew the Company had sent them to scan the mountain range at the back of Landing, they’d been as near hostile to them as they could be.
His instincts were telling him there was something wrong about the whole setup, that even the nurse was hiding something from him. It was a hell of a time to be stuck flat on his back with a broken thigh!
He froze, hearing a small sound from behind the drapes off to his right. Slowly, he turned his head.
“You better have a good reason for…” he began quietly.
“There’s nothing wrong with your leg now,” she said, pushing the curtains aside and moving closer to the light so he could see her. “They’re lying to you. And your friend isn’t dead. He escaped.”
He scanned her face, taking a moment or two to recognize her. She’d been at the town meeting when they’d been asked to explain why they were there. What was her name? Avana! That was it.
Small, her long, fair hair now drawn back in a single plait, she was clad in the ubiquitous jeans and sweater of the colony. He knew he was focusing on irrelevancies, but what she was saying, after the events of the last few days…
She moved closer, walking around the bottom of his bed to his injured side, then stopped. Seeing a flash of metal in her hands, he uttered a wordless cry, lurching forward to stop her.
The knife flashed, slicing through the cables holding his leg up. Released, it fell to the bed. He braced himself for pain that never came.
“I told you,” she said, leaning down to sever the bindings on the cast that encased his leg from groin to foot.
“Hey!” He grabbed her hand, holding it firm against her attempts to pull free. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
She stopped struggling, eying him up and down. “They certainly don’t choose you Company men for brains, do they? Mind you, you are quite cute, though. Nice green eyes. I’m taking off the cast; what do you think I’m doing?”
The compliment threw him for a moment, until he realized it was what she’d intended. “My leg’s broken…”
“What makes you think that? Does it hurt?” she demanded.
He stared at her, taken aback by her vehemence.
She took advantage of his loss of attention and pulled free, her knife quickly slipping under the remaining fastenings and severing them.
“Stop!” he hissed, instinctively jerking his leg away, then wincing as the blade grazed his flesh. “Damnit, woman! You don’t have to slice me up to prove your point!”
Slipping the knife back into its sheath, she stood, hands on hips, and regarded him dispassionately.
“If you don’t believe me, look at the palm of your left hand.”
“Why?”
“You hurt it, probably on the side of your scouter. There was a dressing on it when you arrived here.”
He closed his hand into a fist, determined not to do what she wanted. “What does that prove?”
“So don’t look then. You can fly a shuttle, can’t you?”
He frowned, thrown again by her sudden change of topic. “I can, but what has that to do with anything?”
“The Deigon’s left. The Company believes you both died in the avalanche.”
“What?” Stunned, he sank back against the pile of pillows.
“They won’t be back for another ten years, ’cause winter’s just started here.”
“They can’t have left… Why would they think we’re dead?”
“Because the town told them you were.”
He felt a tug on the cast and immediately turned his attention back to her. “Dammit! Leave my leg alone!”
“Only if you look at your hand,” she said, continuing to work her way up the form-fitting cast, pulling the sides apart.
“All right! Just stop!” he snarled, unclenching his hand and turning it over to examine. There wasn’t a mark on it.
Nothing made sense right now, but somehow, what Avana was telling him seemed more credible than anything he’d been told since he and Weis had crashed on the mountain.
“How?” he asked, leaning forward to take hold of the top of his cast, where it was against his groin, and pull the sides apart. If his hand could have healed that quickly… He had to know if his leg had been broken.
“I’ll tell you if you help me,” she said, reaching out to help him.
He batted her hands away and pulled the cast apart. “I can manage.”
She pouted briefly. “You’re spoiling my fun.”
Ignoring her comment, he stared at the pink jagged line on the top of his thigh, the one that hadn’t been there a few days ago.
Her hand reached down, one brown finger lightly tracing its length. “That’s where the broken bone came through. Not bad for only three days. You might find your leg a little painful for another day, so be careful,” she said, her tone very matter-of-fact.
“I want to know what the hell is going on here, and I want to know now!”
“I’ll tell you when we’re in the air,” she said. “The nurse will come to check on you again shortly. You do want to be gone by then, don’t you?”
“Help me get this off,” he said, suddenly making up his mind and releasing her. He began pulling at the cast again.
“That’s not the way,” she said, stopping him. “Roll over on your side, with your back to me. I’ll cut it down the center, then it’ll just fall off.”
He looked at her suspiciously for a moment, watching as her face lit up in an elfin grin.
“What, don’t you trust me? I’d never take advantage of a man in his sickbed… unless invited.”
“You’re mad,” he said with feeling, rolling over, but turning his head so he could watch her.
“Not mad,” she said, pulling out her knife, all trace of the grin now gone. “Just different.”
“I’ll need my clothes. Do you know where they are?”
“In the closet over there,” she said, nodding her head toward a corner of the room.
The repaired tears and the rubbed patches of cloth on his insulated fatigues were impossible to miss. Thoughtfully, he ran his fingers over them. No one could fake that kind of damage. What she’d told him must be true.
“Nothing gets thrown away in Landing,” she said, uncannily following his thoughts. “Everything’s reused. Hurry up. Much as I hate to lose the rather pleasant view of you in your shorts, we must leave now.”
He glanced at her again, trying to work out how old she was as he balanced himself on his good leg and started pulling the one-piece on.
She moved closer, ready for him to lean on as he put his full weight on his injured leg. There was an ageless quality about her, but this close, he could see the tiny signs that she had left the first flush of youth behind-laughter lines at the edges of her eyes and frown ones between her eyebrows.
“I’ll answer all your questions later, when we’re in the air,” she said, holding up the top of his fatigues for him, taking the weight so he could push his arms into the sleeves.
“Lady, I’m going nowhere with you till I get some answers,” he said, pulling up the zipper and sealing the protective flap over it.
Shrugging, she turned away. “Then you can stay here and I’ll try to fly the shuttle myself.”
“That’s insane, especially in this weather!”
“You keep saying those words,” she said, frowning. “I assure you if you come with me, you’ll find out that I’m perfectly sane. Now, are you coming or not?”
Knowing she had no intention of telling him anything until she got her own way, he followed her to the window with an exclamation of annoyance.
Outside, though there was no sign of snow on the ground, it was bitterly cold. The night sky overhead was only partially clouded; every now and then the crescent moon swam into view, illuminating the village that was Landing.
Almost immediately, they’d stopped behind the generator shed belonging to the medical facility, where she’d hidden her own winter gear-brown fur jacket and hood and plain fur-lined trousers that tucked into the matching boots she wore.
“They’ll be cold,” he said, picking up her jacket as she began hauling the pants over her jeans.
“You don’t know much about Danu, do you? Furs like these are better stored outside. Helps them keep their thermal properties.”
He held the jacket for her as she shrugged herself into it.
“Follow me, and keep to the shadows.”
She led him round the outside of the village, darting into the shadows of the buildings whenever the moon lit up the sky.
“The place is deserted. I thought you said Weis had escaped. Doesn’t look to me like they’re looking for him or guarding anything.”
“They aren’t. They expect the mountain to kill him,” she said shortly, as they waited in the lee of one of the communal buildings for the moon to disappear behind the clouds again.
“The mountain? Why the hell would that kill him?” Even as he said it, he felt a shiver of uncertainty run through him.
“How much do you remember about the crash, Jensen?”
“Everything, of course! The wind slammed us into the mountain and the actual crash knocked us out.”
“Then what?” she asked, turning round to look at him.
“We got out and… walked away from the scouter before it blew up.” Even as he said it, he knew that wasn’t right.
“You saw or heard something else, though, didn’t you? You must have.”
Her brown eyes regarded him seriously as he tried to remember that night.
There had been something more, he was sure of it, but the harder he tried, the more it seemed to slip away from him.
“I can’t remember,” he said, angry and frustrated with himself. “You know what it was, so tell me!”
“I can’t,” she said, turning away again. “You have to remember it for yourself.”
The moon disappeared behind a large cloudbank, plunging them into darkness.
“Let’s go!” she whispered, starting to run out across the last open space to the building where the shuttle was stored.
Safely inside, she switched on the lights, almost blinding them both after the darkness outside.
“Won’t they see the lights?” he asked, blinking and rubbing his eyes.
“No,” she said, pushing her hood back and taking off her mitts. “It’s the middle of the night, and the building has no windows.”
Satisfied, he did the same as he walked over to where two squat grey vehicles took up most of the hangar space.
“You’ve got two shuttles?”
“We had three but we lost one in the first year.”
Jumping up on the running board at the nose of the nearer one, he thumbed the opening mechanism. The door slid back, allowing him a good view of the cramped bridge.
“These are ancient,” he said. “They should have been scrapped fifty years ago.”
“The Company isn’t exactly known for its altruism toward its settlers,” she said drily. “We’re grateful to have even these. This one is fueled and ready to go. Can you fly it?”
“In my sleep, darling,” he said, turning back to grin at her. “In my sleep.” For the first time since the crash, he felt confident of his ability to handle the situation.
Time seemed to slow as he watched her mouth drop open and her eyes widen in fear. Then something cold and hard was pressed against the back of his neck.
“You ain’t goin’ nowhere, Jensen. I’m taking this shuttle. You just step back down onto the ground and back away.”
“Weis! They said you were dead.”
“Well, they were wrong. Move it!” Weis snarled. A hefty shove in the middle of his back sent Jensen stumbling off the running board, down to the concrete floor.
“Weis, what the hell are you doing?” he demanded.
“Same as you, but for different reasons. There’s aliens out there on the mountain, that’s what you saw and heard, and they’re controlling the settlers, twisting their memories till they believe what they want! I got me some of Landing’s explosives, and I aim to stop it, not warn them we’ve found out the truth!”
“Will you listen to yourself, Weis? Aliens? Mind control? That’s wild talk. We’ve thirteen colonies now, and not one world has had any life more intelligent than a mouse on it!”
“They made you forget, Jensen, but they couldn’t wipe my memories.” Weis gave a short, bitter laugh and reached up to touch the scar that ran from one temple, across his forehead and out of sight into his cropped hair. “See, I got lucky. A rock hit me on the head, made it impossible for them to mess with my mind. As for that woman, I wouldn’t get too cozy with her; the rest of the village is afraid of her, she’s important to them.”
“Don’t be a fool, Weis. Even if what you say is true, you can’t possibly kill all of them! At worst you’ll start a war…”
Avana pushed past him. “Weis, you’re wrong,” she said, taking a few slow steps toward the shuttle. “It’s not what you think. There’s no mind control, no danger to us.”
“Come any closer and I’ll shoot you,” said Weis, pointing the gun at her.
“You don’t know the whole truth,” she began, taking another step.
“Avana, no!” said Jensen, lurching forward for her as Weis let off a warning shot.
It hit the concrete just in front of her as he grasped her around the waist and swung her out of the line of fire. He felt her stiffen in shock, then relax back against him.
“Enough talk! I’m outta here!” snarled Weis, stepping back and closing the shuttle door.
“You OK?” Jensen demanded as he put her down, then dragged her with him to the back of the hanger, well clear of the shuttle’s exhausts.
“Yes.”
“He’s lost it,” he muttered, pushing her down behind some packing crates. “That blow to the head did some serious damage.”
The shuttle’s engines roared into life, drowning out anything else he was going to say.
He leaned over her, putting his mouth to her ear. “Now what? This is going to wake the whole damned village.”
The shuttle rose into the air, the whine of the engines getting louder and louder until suddenly it shot forward.
Jensen flung himself of top of Avana as they heard it crashing its way through the closed doors. Splinters of wood rained down around them.
“Can you get off me now?”
Hearing the pain in her voice, hurriedly he rolled off her. “You sure you’re all right?” he asked, helping her up.
“I’m fine, just landed awkwardly,” she said, but there was a drawn look about her face he didn’t like.
“We need to stop him,” she said. “The villagers will help us now; they wouldn’t have before.”
“You don’t seriously believe there are aliens out there, do you?”
She motioned him to silence, stepping out from behind the crates as the first of the villagers rushed in, half-dressed and brandishing a shotgun. Jensen joined her, determined that whatever happened, she’d not face it alone. He recognized Nolan, the leader of the small colony, instantly.
“Is this your doing, Avana?” Nolan demanded, coming to an abrupt stop when he saw them. “What’s he doing here?”
“It was Weis, Nolan. He was hiding in the shuttle. He’s taken explosives… gone looking for… them.” Her voice trailed off as the hangar began to fill with more of the angry colonists.
“You had to tell him, didn’t you?” demanded the woman next to Nolan. “Just had to meddle again!”
“I told him nothing except his leg was healed.”
“Be quiet, Kate,” said Nolan, lowering his gun. “You’re missing what’s important here. Weis has gone hunting them with explosives.”
“We have to warn them. Jensen is taking me,” Avana said.
“You were going there anyway,” accused Kate. “That’s why you let him out!”
“She’s been Called again, hasn’t she?” said another woman from the rear of the small group. “I told you not to stop her going last time, Nolan, but you had to listen to Kate!”
“No one wanted to take her, Mary, you know that,” muttered one of the men.
“I’m not going near them again, and you can’t blame me seeing as no one else volunteered,” said his neighbor.
Jensen was growing angrier by the minute as he listened to them degenerate into squabbles.
“It wasn’t my decision,” said Nolan, stung by the accusation. “You all voted for it at the town meeting!”
“I warned you there’d be trouble,” said Mary, pulling her fur jacket tighter around her and pushing to the front. “Not only did you break the agreement, but you stopped Avana from going to them. You, Llew, have no backbone!” she said, turning on the youth. “They’ve never done us harm, only helped us. Now this Weis is going to try and destroy them. Just what do you think they’ll do about that?”
“I have to go now,” said Avana, trying to pitch her voice to carry over those of the villagers. “I need to warn them.”
“Just a goddam minute!” said Jensen, raising his voice so it did drown them all out. “I want to know what the hell’s going on here! Who’s this them you keep talking about, for starters?”
Silence fell abruptly as they turned to face him, suddenly remembering his presence.
“Well?” he demanded again when no one answered.
“The yukitenshi,” said someone quietly from the rear of the group.
“That’s Company talk,” another said derisively.
“Snow Angels, the Sidhe, Children of Danu, call them what you will,” said Mary. “They live up in the mountains and mostly keep to themselves, thanks to Avana. They don’t scare me! I’m not forgetting to keep the old ways!” She glowered around at the dozen people gathered in the hangar.
“Snow angels? The Sidhe?” said Jensen, more confused than before.
“Llew, Conner, get the shuttle fueled up and ready to go,” said Nolan abruptly. “You’re right, Mary, we should never have stopped Avana from going the last time they Called her. Fetch food for them, three days’ worth.”
“Mark my words, Nolan, you’ll live to regret this!” said Kate. “Because it was right for you thirty years ago doesn’t mean it is for us younger ones! Let him kill them…”
“Come with me, Kate,” said Mary firmly, grasping the younger woman by the arm and forcefully escorting her from the hangar.
Nelson turned back to Jensen and Avana. “Is there anything else you need? There’s comm units and face masks as well as ropes and other rescue gear on board.”
“A med kit, please,” Avana said. “And sensible winter gear for Jensen. I had some for him in the other shuttle.”
Jensen watched the sudden activity, aware of a dull ache beginning behind his eyes. Doggedly he kept focused on the one fact that currently posed the most danger.
“You’re serious, aren’t you? There really are indigenous natives on Kogarashi.”
Nolan looked questioningly at Avana.
“He’s forgotten, like the others did,” she confirmed. “We call it Danu, Jensen.”
“We don’t rightly know what they are, Jensen, but they do belong here,” said Nolan.
“Why didn’t you tell the Company? These are the first aliens we’ve ever come across! We made laws against colonizing a world that’s already inhabited by intelligent life!”
“We didn’t know at first, and by the time we did, it was too late. The Company had sunk too much into setting up our colony. Besides, what do we tell them? I told you, we don’t know what manner of beings they are.” Nolan glanced obliquely at Avana. “You’ll understand when you see them.”
“How do you know these are the first aliens mankind has met?” said Avana. “None of us trusted the Company enough to tell them.”
“Colonization is a ruthless business, Jensen, you should know that.”
He did, but to think that any company would commit genocide just to remain on a colony world…
“I’ll need weapons,” he said tiredly, rubbing his aching temples. “For Avana too. Weis isn’t going to be easily stopped.”
“We aren’t aiming to stop him directly,” Avana said. “We need to warn them first. Our advantage is he doesn’t know where they live, and I do. Nolan, I’m going to wait inside the shuttle. Don’t let him do any lifting. That leg of his may be healed but it’s still weak.”
The half-hour it took to get them fueled and provisioned was revealing for Jensen-what the colonists refused to say about Avana and the aliens told him as much as what they did. He taxied out into the moonlight, then began to accelerate away from the village.
“What’s that?” he asked as they flew over a ring of small boulders just to the west of the village. “A Zen garden?”
“You could say that. It’s the ring.”
“Any painkillers in your medicine kit? I’ve got the mother and father of all headaches,” he asked as a stab of pain made him wince.
Avana stirred. “There should be. I’ll go look.”
“See if you can find something I can eat now,” he added, checking his bearings on the small nav screen and heading out toward the mountains. “I don’t think they fed me much over the last three days. You should have something too-you’re looking pale.”
Cramped though the bridge section was, there was a reasonable-sized cargo area behind them. As he listened to Avana rifling through the various bags that had been stowed there, he began to relax a little for the first time that night. On the Doppler screen, it showed exactly what Nolan had predicted-clear weather across the plains and into the lower foothills; then they’d hit a storm worse than the one that had caused him and Weis to crash. He planned to land and weather it out, just as Weis would be forced to do.
She came back, sitting down in her seat and stowing the drinks in the armrest console before handing him a couple of pills. When he’d taken them, she held out a regulation non-spill mug.
He was surprised to find it was hot coffee.
“We have a small coffee plantation on the foothills,” she said, handing him a sandwich, then buckling herself in.
“I think it’s time you told me our exact destination,” he said before taking a bite.
“It’s close to where you were before-the small valley just off the plateau. There are some caves there. You must have seen them on your scans.”
“Yeah, Weis wanted a good look at them. Is that where your aliens live?”
“It’s the entrance, yes. I know about the blizzard, but get us as close as you can before stopping.”
“What are they like?” he asked, glancing over at her as she nibbled on a granola bar.
“You know what they’re like. You saw them.”
“If I did, I don’t remember, so humor me and tell me.”
“Do you know what the Sidhe are?”
“Stop answering me with a question every time I ask you something! You promised me answers, Avana.”
“I am answering you,” she said, taking a mouthful of her drink. “Do you know what the Sidhe are?”
“Mary told me something of them.”
“They’re supposed to be one of the original inhabitants of Eire, or Ireland. It was said they were angels, fallen ones, too good to go to hell and too mischievous to go to heaven. A few besides me have seen them, but all they see is a ghost of what they truly are-a flicker that is hardly there.”
“And you can communicate with them?”
She gave him a long look. “They communicate with me, but I am learning.”
“Doesn’t sound very friendly.”
She smiled. “You’ll see.”
“Is it because of them that you all refused to map the Splitback and scan it for minerals?”
“Who said we refused? We lost the scanning equipment when we lost the shuttle.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“Yes. I’m tired, Jensen. Let me rest a while,” she said, folding her arms across her lap and shutting her eyes.
“You were on that shuttle, weren’t you?”
“What makes you think that? Do you really think I am that old?”
“It’s the only way you could have met these Snow Angels.”
She said nothing for a minute or two then murmured, “Jensen, don’t ask me a question unless you really want to know the answer.”
He glanced over at her again, seeing the high cheek-bones, the slightly upturned nose, and the pale braid lying against the dark fur of the jacket, comparing her to Mary. There was no comparison-how could he have thought they were the same age?
“Who rescued us, Avana? Was it them or your people?” he asked suddenly.
“Later, when we land, I’ll tell you,” she said.
“It was them, wasn’t it?” he demanded, feeling his blood run cold, but Avana said nothing, just lay there, her breathing slowing as she slept.
***
Her sleep was not restful. Jensen watched as she moved fretfully, muttering words that even his good hearing couldn’t identify. They were deep in the storm now, almost at the caves when she suddenly sat bolt upright.
“Hoshi! The mountain! Watch out!”
“What the hell?” he muttered, adrenaline rushing through his system as he pulled the scouter back on course. He glanced at her, seeing her staring out the windshield, eyes wide open in terror.
“Avana.” Attention still on the nav screen and looking ahead of them, he reached across for her shoulder, shaking her gently. “Wake up, Avana.”
She shuddered, blinked, then looked around her, hand reaching up to grasp his as her gaze came to rest on him. “I’m sorry, I had a bad dream.”
“You sure did. It aged me ten years at least,” he said, trying to make light of it as he squeezed her hand comfortingly before returning his to the controls.
He risked a glance at her, seeing how gray her complexion had become as she began to shiver uncontrollably. With a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, he realized she was in shock.
“Dammit, Avana! Weis shot you, didn’t he? Don’t try to deny it!” he said as she opened her mouth to speak. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me?”
“You wouldn’t have brought me and I had to come.”
“Your life is more important than this!”
“The whole colony depends on me. I have to go-they Called me,” she said, wiping her sleeve across her sweating forehead. “It’s only a flesh wound.”
He swore, volubly and descriptively, cursing himself most of all for missing the signs she’d been hit. “Don’t lie to me, girl! I know the symptoms. Where did he hit you and how bad is it?” he demanded, his attention now torn between her and piloting the craft through the rapidly worsening snow storm.
“My arm, and I don’t know how bad,” she said, her voice quavering a little. “I put a pressure bandage on it when I came into the shuttle.”
On the scanner, he saw a flat area ahead and changed course for it. “I’m taking the shuttle down. You need treatment now, Avana.”
She sat forward, looking at his nav screen. “Just a bit further, please,” she said. “We’re almost there. They’ll heal me. I only need to…”
“No!” he snarled, starting to descend. “I’m not risking your life!”
“Jensen, please,” she whispered, sitting back and hunching herself around her injured arm. “I’ve had worse, trust me.”
“No, dammit! You’re the only sane thing on this godforsaken planet!”
The landing was not one of the smoothest; he had to break hard on the maneuver jets as the shuttle began to skid on the glassy surface, but they were down and safe.
“It’s too dangerous here, Jensen! My blood will bring them to us! Weis could be nearby…”
“Blood? Great, they’re vampires as well,” he muttered, releasing his harness and instantly going to her side.
She laughed faintly as he undid her harness and scooped her into his arms. “Not vampires. It’s the life-energy in blood-makes it easier for them to find me in a blizzard.”
He carried her to the cargo area, sitting her down on one of the crates secured there, resting her back against the hull. “Where’s the med kit?” he demanded, shaking her as her eyes began to close. “Don’t you dare fall asleep on me, Avana!” he said harshly.
Her eyes flicked open and she looked around. “In the bag there,” she said, pointing to one secured against the opposite bulkhead.
He fetched it, then began to strip her out of her jacket. Now he could see the burned hole on the inner side of her sleeve. Flinging her jacket around her shoulders, he let her lean back again. Squatting beside her, he lifted her injured arm.
She’d pushed her sweater sleeve up before placing the pressure pad over the wound. Thankfully it had acted as a basic tourniquet, but she’d still lost a lot of blood. Reaching for a fresh pressure pad, he ripped the wrapping off, laying it aside before carefully removing the old one.
The energy blast had clipped her on the inside of her upper arm, vaporizing an area about four inches wide and over an inch deep. Much of it had been cauterized, but there was still a slow seeping of blood and fluids. He thought he saw the glint of bone. Swallowing hard a couple of times, he hastily covered the wound with the new dressing. This was beyond his ability to treat except with the most basic first aid.
“Bad, eh?” she said, watching his face.
“Not good. The beam was wider since it was deflected up at you. Avana, we need to get you back to the settlement,” he said, carefully binding the dressing in place. That done, he took the scissors and began cutting through the rolled-up sweater. “You’ve lost a lot of blood.”
“Just take me to the caves, Jensen. They’ll heal me. I’ve had worse, believe me.”
“You’re too weak…”
“Jensen, listen to me! We have to go on. If Weis succeeds, they’ll come for the colony, especially after they prevented me from going last time I was Called. There’s energy drinks in the pack where the med kit was. Help me back to my seat and give me one of them,” she said, getting unsteadily to her feet. “It’ll keep me going till we reach them. Trust me-trust them.”
He got to his feet, reaching out to catch her jacket as it slipped from her shoulders.
“This will be the death of you, Avana, and I don’t want that,” he said, helping her put the jacket back on. “Why should I trust them?”
“Because they’ve saved you from death already, Jensen, as once they did for me. And they’ve Called you-the first time they’ve ever asked to meet anyone but me,” she said, her hand touching his cheek.
Memories began to return then, of a fleeting, feather-light, bitterly cold touch on his cheek, of humanoid shapes fluttering in the blizzard, crying out in voices as haunting as those of the whales; of being drawn from the avalanche and clasped firmly in strong arms, while lips as cold as ice touched his, breathing life and health back into a body wracked by pain.
He pulled her close, almost crushing her to him in his need to know what was real. She was his touch-stone, his only anchor on this alien world.
“You’ve remembered,” she whispered, her lips brushing his. “They saved you, healed you, then brought you to the ring at Landing for us to find. Take me to them, Jensen. We’re closer to them than Landing.”
“I’ll take you, but don’t you die on me, Avana!” he said, covering her face in kisses, driving back the memories of the coldness with her warmth. “Promise not to leave me,” he said, reluctantly letting go of her to carry her back to her seat.
She chuckled. “I’ll do my best.” She stiffened suddenly, grasping hold of his arm. “They’re here! Take me to the door and open it!”
He hesitated, scared to the depths of his soul, yet thankful at the same time. Through the windshield, he saw movement, white shapes within the swirling snow, and heard again their plaintive song. Turning, he walked to the door, letting her reach out to open it.
Heart racing, he watched it slide back, fearful of what it would reveal. Nothing waited for them, only the darkness and the snow. It took all his courage to step out of the shuttle and down onto the icy ground.
A sudden downdraft of air and snow swirled into his face, temporarily blinding him. He heard the sound of large wings beating the air, and felt the weight of Avana in his arms lessening.
“No!” he cried out, trying to grasp her tighter, blinking furiously to clear his vision. “She’s mine, not yours! You can’t have her!”
Then she, and the sound of the wings, were gone.
Frantically, he searched the darkness for her. “Avana!”
Suddenly one of them stood not ten feet from him. She was everything Avana had said they were-tall and slim, her long hair and skin as pale as the snow around them, and beautiful in a way that was truly unearthly. The more he stared at her, the more she seemed to elude his senses. Her whole body shimmered and flickered as if she was not quite there. She stepped toward him, cocking her head on one side, gesturing to him. He couldn’t pretend not to understand; the gesture for Come was universal.
“Oh my God, you’re real,” he muttered, backing off until he felt the hull of the shuttle behind him.
Come. This time he heard it inside his head. The mental voice was as unearthly as the song had been. She came closer, her steps slow and measured, her body swaying elegantly. With another shock, he realized she was naked save for a simple short kilt.
He closed his eyes, only opening them when he felt her hands encircle his waist. Vertical slitted eyes of pale gray gazed back at him as she drew him close against her cool body. She might look insubstantial, but she was real.
A shadow fell over them and the sound of the slow beat of wings filled his ears. He felt his feet leaving contact with the ground and clutched her desperately around the waist. He’d barely time to register that she was covered in a soft fur before the cold winter wind was whistling past his face, making his eyes sting. Instinctively he turned his head, finding his face buried, not in fur, but soft, downy feathers.
The wind dropped and all he could hear was the beat of her wings. Risking a glance, by the faint luminesence that seemed to surround her, he saw they were traversing a wide tunnel.
A shot rang out; she faltered, her wing-beats becoming irregular.
“Weis, no!” he yelled, clutching her more tightly as her flight became erratic. “Godamnit! They’re friendly!”
Suddenly the cavern was filled with the sound of many wings and harsh singsong calls. Strong male hands grasped him, ripping him from her embrace, talons jabbing uncomfortably through the hide of his jacket into him. He was flown to the other side, then dropped unceremoniously to the ground.
Scrambling to his feet, he looked up. Overhead, the cavern was a shifting mass of glowing, flickering white shapes, weaving between each other and calling out with harsh, singsong cries of anger.
“He has explosives!’ he yelled. “Avana and I, we came to warn you!”
The calls died down to a sound like the faint buzzing of angry bees.
He took the life of one of us. The voice, its tone harsh even inside his mind, came from behind him. Injured our Envoy, Avana. He must suffer for this. Be grateful you were Called to be her mate.
He spun around, finding himself facing a group of four aliens, one of whom held Avana. He tried to move, to call out to her, but something, or someone, held him motionless.
Once again he felt the downdraft of wings beating on his face as the fallen one was gently laid at the feet of the tallest.
Jensen stared at the body. Now that she was dead, the glowing aura that had suffused her in life was gone, as was the flickering quality. Now he could see her clearly. There were no wings, and the opalescent feathers that covered her whole body were now a dull, lifeless gray. Anger welled up in him for the loss of her life, and Weis’s senseless violence.
She will rest where she fell, as is our way, said the tall one, stepping forward and stretching out his hand over her lifeless form.
The ground began to tremble, gently at first, then more harshly until a fissure formed under her body and slowly she sank into it. With one last rumble, the gap closed over her.
As he watched, Jensen knew how their scouter had vanished.
Held between two males, Weis was brought forward.
Once more the cries rose in pitch, but from Weis, there was no sound. Released, the burly pilot stood there, as unable to move as Jensen.
You took the gift of life from us and used it to harm our Envoy and kill one of us, said the tall one. Our rule is a life for a life. Yours is now forfeit. He gestured to one of those beside him. Tyril.
Beyond shock and fear, Jensen watched as Tyril stepped forward and stood in front of Weis. Wings that were not wings unfurled and gradually, the pearly white glow that surrounded Tyril faded, grew darker until his wings were shot with an angry dark red. Then, reaching out, Tyril touched Weis.
The man seemed to crumple, to fold up on himself and shrink until finally he fell to the ground. Jensen felt a shiver of fear course through him: he had no doubt at all that Weis was dead.
What of the village? Tyril demanded, turning back to his leader, wings furling and unfurling in anger. They broke our agreement, Nephil, kept the Envoy from us!
Yet here she is, and the Man we Called, sent by them with a warning, Nephil replied.
Then let me visit them, remind them not to neglect the agreement!
I will consider it.
No! Leave the village! They did you no harm! he yelled mentally, praying they could hear him.
Nephil swung his head toward him briefly before turning back to look at the one holding Avana. Heal our Envoy.
Jensen watched, helpless, as the one holding Avana bent over her, touching his lips to hers, infusing her with his life force. Gradually, the glow that surrounded him faded, making him appear more solid, until Avana began to stir. Lifting his head, he set Avana down on her feet.
She inclined her head to him. “Thank you, Caer,” he heard her say.
Be more careful, little sister. You have great value to me.
“I’ll try, Caer.”
Turning to the leader, she once again bowed her head. “Thank you, Lord Nephil, for coming to our aid.”
Nephil gestured to his left and as she moved there, Jensen found himself staggering forward as whatever compulsion had held him motionless was suddenly lifted. He ran to her side, anxious to know for himself that she was well again.
“I’m fine,” she said, taking his hand.
Caer, take them within. I will decide the fate of the Landers now.
“Don’t harm them,” she said as Caer joined them. “They only prevented me leaving out of fear for my safety.”
Tyril frowned, his aura darkening slightly in anger. This is not your concern. Go with Caer. They must be taught to value what you sacrifice for their benefit.
“They sent us to warn you…” Jensen began.
Go!
Avana pulled him close and whispered, “It’s not wise to argue with him in front of his people.”
“But the colonists…”
“Will survive,” she said as they followed Caer out of the cavern and down the adjacent tunnel. “Danu’s Children are not fools. They each depend on the other. It just takes one visit each generation for Landing to realize it’s better to keep the agreement.”
“What’s this agreement you all keep taking about?” In the distance ahead he could see a faint glow and already the air was beginning to feel warmer.
“The first year we were here, they stole some of our cattle and developed a liking for beef. Now, in return for leaving them alone, we leave some milk and cheese out for them, and give them the occasional side of beef. They also keep an eye on our herd beasts grazing on the lower slopes. They’re omnivores like us and eat mainly the mountain deer and goat-like creatures native to Danu. I also teach them about our art and literature in exchange for learning about them. Primarily, they’re teaching me how to heal. The headache pills I gave you earlier were one of their recipes.”
“Why am I here?”
You were Called, as she was. You can learn our ways and be a mate for her, said Caer.
Avana’s face flushed and she looked away from him. “You were one of the original settlers, weren’t you?” he asked, choosing for both their sakes to ignore what Caer had said.
“Why do you need to know?”
“A question isn’t an answer.”
“Yes, I was. I was the only survivor of the first shuttle crash. They hadn’t had chance to meet any of us till then, so I was brought here to be healed. They soon realized I could understand them and began to exchange learning with me. Time isn’t the same inside the mountain, Jensen. I think it’s because they don’t quite live in the same dimension as us. What was weeks for me, when I went back to Landing, had been years there.”
He digested this for a few minutes. “Then the reason my leg was healed was because I was here.”
“You were missing for three months. That’s why Nolan told the Deigon you were dead. We thought you were.”
“And being Called?”
“Means staying with them for some time as students, and helping me find a way to stop the Company from finding out about them.”
He glanced at Caer pacing elegantly beside them, imagining how the Company would want to either exploit these people, or anger them to the point that war ensued. Beings with mental powers, access to a new dimension where time ran at a different rate from the world outside; he could imagine how salable a commodity this would be for any company, let alone theirs.
“Do they know what’s at stake?” he asked, looping his arm around her waist and drawing her in against his side.
“Oh yes. That’s why they call me their Envoy, Jensen. They’re preparing me-us,” she amended, “to speak for them and defend their rights.”
“Sounds to me like a good way to spend the next ten years.”