Stardogs (23 page)

“Birds!”

“Probably not. Probably some local creature,” said Tanzo

Lila squinted into the late afternoon sun. “Birds. Condor-harpies. You can even see the markings on their wings.”

“But they’re native to Oz!” said Tanzo, whose knowledge was expansive, even if xenoarchaelogy did color it.

“The Denaari might have brought them here,” said Brettan.

“What for? They’re disgusting horrible things!” Lila was surprised at the depth of her feelings. But seeing them had brought it all to the surface again. She could remember those terrible toothed beaks tearing into the cows, and the way the cattle’s eyes had rolled as the Condor-harpies talon-poison paralysed their muscles. It been the flock of Condor-harpies that had been the last straw for the farm, after the drought.

“They’re carbon-based lifeforms. They eat meat. Therefore there must be meat for them to eat. Therefore we too can find food. Or we can eat them,” said Deo gravely. He had refused to stay back in the ship, and appeared to be keeping up well. Shari still watched him anxiously.

Lila felt herself retching at the thought of eating Condor-harpy. She turned away, unable to speak.

“Well, I’m blowed if I’ll eat something like that. I’d sooner dine on one of you lot,” Sam Teovan surprised her by bursting out. Lila found herself looking at the wiry scar-faced man with approval for the first time. Sam had surprised himself too. The hit on Oz had been a failure in that their target had already fled into the outback. By the time Sam and the local contact had tracked the man down the runner had already fallen victim to Condor-harpies. They’d killed the paralysed man who had had his eyes and part of his liver ripped out by the birds. But if the man had been able to speak he would have begged them to do it. The memory frightened Sam in other ways too. In the city he was as at home as a rat. Out there, well, nature had nearly killed him a couple of times.

“Be sure you’ll be first on the menu, Yak, if we get to that,” Martin Brettan said grimly.

Shari sighed. They were still bickering, instead of exploring as they’d set out to do. Couldn’t they see they had to unite to survive? She’d try for a change of subject. “Isn’t that a cave over there?”

“Could be, Princess. Could be. You got sharp eyes. Let’s go and have look.” Sam gave her his lop-sided grin, and set off.

“I still think we should kill that bloody Yak scum,” Martin Brettan muttered. He was surprised when the angular Leaguesman next to him agreed vehemently.

The cave was about a quarter of a mile from where the ship lay half imbedded in the slip-face of a huge sand-dune. As caves go this one would have rated a Neolithic minus 10. It was stony and shallow, and the roof had, in the past, parted with huge shards. Several hanging pieces still looked unstable, as if a shout might bring them down. The wind off the sand blew straight into it. “It’ll do for a start. I think we should carry as much stuff up here as we can tonight,” said Shari.

“Tonight!” Johannes Wienan looked at the unappealing overhang.

“Tonight. It might as well be as soon as possible. We are going to have to live here. That dune is eventually going to swallow the ship. We might as well get as much out as we can while we can still get in through the lock. Of course the injured come out first. Then water. Then food. Tools. Warm things.”

“But we can’t live out here!” Kadar stared at the cave.

“Where else?” said Deo.

Tanzo nudged the frightened looking ridergirl. Then, with a particularly nasty smile she bowed to the leaguesmen, and in handspeech said, “Welcome to your new Dacha, lords.”

Kadar snarled at her, seeing another spy.

Johannes didn’t. Instead his eyes narrowed, noticing those who laughed. The Princess. The Viscount. His rebellious debt-slave. Even the Princess’s factotum permitted himself a flicker of a smile. The rider had just looked, as usual, scared. But that was five people who knew the League’s supposedly secret way of communicating with the riders. Warily, he filed the information for future reference.

“We can construct sleds, if …Sam, can cut some of the cabin walls for us,” Deo, ever practical, said, turning toward the ship and beginning to walk back.

“Remember, once that gas is finished we’ve nothing more to cut metal with,” Martin Brettan said grimly.

“True. And no fuel for a forge either.”

Johannes ached. He had literally never worked so hard in his life before. His eyes had nearly popped out of his head when he had been pulled to his feet from where he’d been sitting on the sand, and told to stop slacking and carry. “But the servants…” The man who had pulled him to his feet looked into his eyes. Suddenly Johannes Wienan was very, very frightened of the Princess’s factotum. “The Princess has already explained that those who do not work, do not eat… or drink.”

“But my arm…”

“We have made up some packs while you sat idle. I will load you. And see that you do not dawdle.”

Johannes soon had reason to wish he’d kept his mouth shut and just chosen to carry things he could manage with one hand. The packs were heavier than anything he’d ever lifted. Then they’d made him join in pulling the loaded sheet-metal sleigh across the sand.

His arm was swollen. He was stiff in every muscle he knew he had, and a few more. The only person who seemed to have taken it worse than himself was that young Prince. Jarian. Turabi’s third son. Why had he been on board the ship? Whatever the reason had been, the Princess had been taking it out on the boy. She’d slapped him when he’d refused to carry a pack. He’d cried. She’d slapped him again. And he’d picked up the pack. Funny, she’d been the one that was all for giving up ranks and titles, but she still gave the orders. And nearly everybody still called
her
‘Princess’.

The moons were up and shining silver on the wreck of the spaceship. Johannes shivered. It was going to be cold out here tonight. The Princess stood up, and began handing out mugs. Johannes saw his debt-slave attempt to stand up and take over from her, and be told firmly to sit. Deo followed with slices of bread. Not very large slices from one of the five loaves they’d found in the kitchen. There’d been less food than they’d hoped. The ship carried very little more than it required for each hop, taking on fresh supplies at each space-station.

Johannes didn’t approve of the mugs. Robust china, intended for the kitchen-staff, they’d survived. The fine porcelain hadn’t. He tasted. Water. Plain water. There’d been ample wine. They’d poured it out to make water bottles! They’d said that water would be more important than wine. Despite the lecture the dumpy woman had given him about alcohol’s diuretic effects, Johannes could never agree with that statement.

It was just plain bread too. He was damned if he’d eat this! Without meaning to, he took a bite, and discovered that hunger is indeed the finest sauce.

He’d drunk the water. Eaten every last crumb of that inadequate piece of bread. He was still both thirsty and hungry. Prince Jarian had asked, no, demanded, more. He’d got a flea in his ear from the Princess, with support from her sycophantic cabal. Carefully Johannes noted them. That dumpy little Duchess. The Countess with the large breasts. The factotum. Well, he would, he was her servant. The surviving bodyguard. And Johannes’s own rebellious debt-slave. If he ever got back to where the rule of Imperial law held, that girl was going to suffer.

Johannes shook his head. He wasn’t going to tolerate this. He wasn’t a pack-mule and he needed better food. And he wasn’t going to put up with any more abuse either. Well, on that one his fellow Leaguesman and he were in agreement. But what other allies did he have? And what weapons could they muster?

The Prince, certainly. But the boy didn’t look very tough, and probably didn’t have a gun. Mind you, you never could tell with someone like that. And perhaps, as he was nearer to the throne than his Aunt, Imperial loyalties could be called on. The bodyguard? It was worth considering. Then there was the Viscount. The thought of Martin Brettan’s face on seeing a bottle of the magnificent 2437 vintage Chateau Lafitte poured out almost brought a smile to the plump, tired Leaguesman’s face. Yes. The Viscount was supposed to be Shari’s consort, but he was definitely unhappy and ripe for a rearrangement of the hierarchy. He was armed and he knew how to use the weapon.

Then there was the Yak. Yes. At the moment the Yak seemed to be basking in the light of the Princess’s favor. She’d definitely warmed to him after he dragged her factotum in, half-concussed. Huh. The Yak had probably hit him. The man would work for whoever offered him the best deal, Johannes was sure.

He fell asleep at this point, leaving the ridergirl right out of his equation.

Martin Brettan was not making that mistake. It was nice to know he had a hole-card. But the Viscount had thought further into the equation than the young Leaguesman. This was not just about food and drink. This was about survival. And offspring. He, Martin Brettan, was going to come out top of the power hierarchy and the reproductive hierarchy. And if he couldn’t get there by charm he’d make sure he’d get there by force. None of these others were in his league. He waited until Shari got up and walked outside, and then followed her.

“The stars are almost familiar, aren’t they? I can make a pretty reasonable guess at where we are… Not that it’ll do us or our children any good.” He put an arm around her waist.

She pushed his arm away and turned the full force of her disconcerting stare on him. In the moonlight he could see her face was expressionless. He knew her well enough to know her danger signals. “Our children?” her voice was just as flat as her expression.

“We’re not going to get back you know. We’ll live and die here. You’re beyond the Emperor’s hand here. There is no reason why we shouldn’t…”

She stepped away from him. “Except one. Nothing personal Martin, but I wouldn’t have you if you were the last man on Earth.”

His nostrils flared. “You prefer your low-born paramour, do you? Well, Shari,
you
should remember this isn’t Earth, or the Empire either.”

“Paramour! How melodramatic. Whom, pray?”

“Don’t play with me, Shari. Remember you don’t have a title, position and bodyguards to hide behind any more. I offered you a choice. But I’ll take what I like when I want to. Neither you nor any of the others can stop me.” He stepped towards her. Otto, hitherto silent, snarled at him.

Somebody cleared their throat in the darkness. “If we may be of assistance, Your Highness?” Lieutenant Albeer, appearing not at all as if he’d been concussed, but instead looking very dangerous, stepped out of the shadow.

The ‘we’ was not wasted on either the Martin Brettan or Shari. He knew it might be a bluff. But then, was this thickset man, whose heavy eyebrows formed a continuous band across his broad face, capable of bluff? Shari knew it meant that Deo simply waited her word.

“Thank you Lieutenant… Mark. Kindly escort this… person back to the cave. There are certain things a girl needs to do… alone.”

The burly bodyguard’s tenseness eased. “Certainly Princess. Come along, you.”

Martin Brettan turned and stormed off back to the cave.

Shari waited until she was certain they were out of earshot. “Deo,” she said quietly, speaking to the darkness, “I really do need… privacy.”

“I will avert my eyes, Princess.”

She sighed. Shook her head at the man in the darkness and squatted, blushing to herself.