The Winds of Gath d-1 Page 5

  "Yes."

  "Do you want to strip, oil, prepare yourself?"

  "No." Dumarest was curt. "Give me the money."

  "A moment. Would you prefer to fight armed? Knives, perhaps?"

  "As I am." Dumarest held out his hand. "Give me the money."

  Crowder shrugged and passed over the coins. Dumarest threw them to Megan, rubbed his hands on the sides of his shirt, then stepped toward the fighter, Moidor smiled.

  He was a beautiful animal and he knew it. He postured, flexing his muscles so that the sun gleamed on lumps and ridges of tissue, throwing shadows into the hollows and concave places. He had spent his life developing his body. He looked indestructible.

  "Come," he smiled as Dumarest stepped forward. "Come into my arms, my brave one. Feel my embrace —and die!"

  His voice was a little slurred, his smile and gesture a little slow. His eyes needed time to change focus. Quick-time still lingered in his blood and compressed the passing seconds. His reflexes were not operating at their normal speed but he was still dangerous. Dumarest didn't have to look at the two dead men to remind himself of that. But it gave him a thin chance, whereas, if the fighter were normal, he would have had no chance at all.

  "You wait," purred Moidor. "You hesitate. Do not be afraid. I bring death as a friend."

  He stepped forward, smiling, his arms raising to shoulder height.

  "Now," he whispered.

  Dumarest kicked him in the knee.

  * * *

  He lashed out with his full force, throwing his shoulders back from the reaching hands, pivoting on his hip. He knew better than to aim for the groin. His foot would have had to travel twice as far; it would have given twice the time to dodge. And he doubted if such a kick would have been effective. The target was too small, the spot too vulnerable not to have been protected.

  He felt something yield beneath the impact of his heavy boot. He let himself fall backward, not fighting the natural movement, rolling as he hit the ground. He scrambled back on guard, ducked as a hand reached for his throat and winced as its companion slammed against his side. He backed quickly. Moidor followed him, stumbling as he rested his weight on his injured knee. Dumarest kicked again as the fighter gripped his shoulder. Moidor sucked in his breath.

  "Quick," he applauded. "Vicious. You make a worthy opponent, my friend." His hands clamped around Dumarest's throat. "You have damaged my knee," he purred. "For that I shall not be kind. I will hurt you in return—badly. You will take a very long time to die."

  His hands began to close. Dumarest flung himself backwards, jerking up his knees and pressing them against the oiled barrel of the fighter's chest. He exerted the strength of his thighs, forcing himself backward against the throttling hands. He was trying to utilize the whole power of his body against the strength of the fingers around his throat. Blood began to pound in his ears and his lungs to burn. Reaching up and back he found the little fingers. Taking one in each hand he pulled outward, levering them from his throat. Moidor opened his hands.

  Impelled by the pressure of his thighs Dumarest fell backward, landing heavily on his upper shoulders. He grunted as a naked foot, as hard as stone, kicked him in the side. He rolled as the same foot lashed at his kidneys. He staggered to his feet, the taste of blood in his mouth, sweat running into his eyes. He dashed it away, looking for the fighter. Moidor stood a few feet away, watching.

  "A taste," he said, "of what is to come."

  Dumarest gulped for breath. Red welts marked his throat and the shirt he had retained as protection against the fighter's nails hung in shreds. He dared not take the time to rip it off. Cautiously he backed, panting as he filled his lungs to oxygenate his blood. He circled so that his back was toward the sun.

  Moidor lunged forward and stumbled. "My knee!" His teeth shone in the cavern of his mouth. "You will pay for that!"

  He hopped forward and Dumarest moved barely in time. He stooped and snatched up a handful of dirt. He darted forward, hurling it into the snarling face, the gleaming eyes. He might as well have thrown a handful of mist.

  He threw himself down and to one side as his rush carried him within reach of the fighter's grasp, his right hand hitting the dirt. He pivoted on his stiffened right arm, swinging his boot in a slashing arc toward the damaged knee. Bone yielded. Off-balance he tried to roll, to spin away from danger.

  He was too slow. Moidor, balanced on one leg, caught his as he scrambled to his feet. Dumarest twisted as hands gripped his shoulders, slamming the edge of his palm across the fighter's nose. Blood spurted, mingling with the sweat and oil, staining the bared teeth vivid crimson.

  "Now!" snarled Moidor. "Now!"

  His hands were steel traps as they closed on the biceps, the fingers digging in to rip the muscle from the bone. Dumarest groaned, tore himself free with maniacal strength of desperation, flung himself behind the gleaming body. Savagely he kicked at the back of the uninjured knee.

  Moidor fell.

  Immediately Dumarest was on his back, one arm locked around his throat, knees grinding into his spine, his free hand clamped on his other wrist. He forced strength into his arms and shoulders and pulled upward against the chin.

  The watching crowd sucked in its breath.

  He pulled harder. His ears began to sing and blackness edged his vision. From somewhere he could hear yells of encouragement but they sounded thin and distant. Beneath him Moidor stirred, hands groping at the dirt for leverage. A moment and he would be free. Dumarest lifted his eyes toward the sun. He heaved.

  Bone snapped.

  The sky turned the color of blood.

  Chapter Six

  THE ROOM WAS very quiet, very cool, the light soft and restful to the eyes. A faint scent of perfume hung in the air, gentling the more acrid odor of antiseptics, almost killing the elusive hint of spice. Something made tiny, metallic sounds to one side and he could hear the sound of breathing. Dumarest turned his head. A woman, no longer young, sat on a low stool before a squat machine. She was simply dressed in green, a caduceus emblazoned on her breast. She smiled as she saw the opened eyes.

  "You are in the tents of the Matriarch of Kund," she said. "I am her personal physician. You are safe and have nothing to fear."

  She was efficient. She had answered his anticipated questions. Her voice was dry, a little precise, but softer than he would have guessed. Dumarest looked past her at the soft hangings of the room, the thick carpet on the floor, the squat machine beside his couch. From it came the tiny, metallic clicking. The woman frowned.

  "Did you understand what I said?"

  "Yes." Dumarest swallowed, surprised that he felt no pain. He touched his throat; it was unmarked, unswollen. He looked at his arm. It was covered by the sleeve of a shirt. The shirt was of a silken, metallic fiber. He was fully dressed, even to his boots, but the clothes were not his own.

  "You made no comment."

  "There was no need." He sat upright and swung his legs over the side of the couch. "I assume that I have been given some kind of medication."

  "You know?"

  "I guessed." He stretched, wondering a little at his feeling of well-being. He felt as he did after waking from a passage. He had been bathed, of course, and drugged and dressed in new clothes. He must also have been fed with intravenous injections of quickly-assimilated concentrates. He wondered why the old woman had treated him so well.

  "The Matriarch is no lover of the Prince of Emmened," said the physician. She seemed able to read his mind or perhaps it was simply the extrapolation of the obvious. "It pleased her to see his fighter die."

  "I killed him?"

  She leaned forward a little, her eyes watchful. "You remember?"

  Dumarest nodded, wondering just what had happened after he'd made his final effort. Bone had snapped, that he could remember, and it must have been Moidor's neck. Then Megan had rushed forward, his face distorted with excitement. But after?

  "You were an automaton," explained the woman. "You stood and m
oved but without conscious awareness. The final exertion had thrown you into metabolic shock. You had overstrained your resources. Left alone you would have collapsed and, without proper treatment, could have died. The Matriarch recognized what had happened and took you under her protection."

  And, thought Dumarest grimly, had undoubtedly saved his life. The treatment he had needed was unavailable in camp and no one else would have risked the enmity of the prince by supplying it.

  "How long have I been here?"

  "I put you under slow-time. Subjectively you have been unconscious for a week. In actual time it has been a little under four hours."

  She turned to study the machine. Lights glowed from behind transparent windows, flickering to the rhythm of the metallic clicks, casting small splotches of color over her face. Thoughtfully Dumarest massaged his throat. The equivalent of a week's skilled medication would more than account for his fitness. But slow-time is expensive. The old woman had been more than generous.

  "I would like to see the Matriarch," he told the physician. "I want to give her my thanks for what she did."

  "That will not be necessary."

  "I think that it is."

  "What you think," she said flatly, "is of no real importance." She did not turn from the machine. "Later, if she should wish, you may have the opportunity of meeting her."

  Her meaning was crystal clear. He had been reminded that while the Matriarch ruled a complex of worlds he was nothing but a penniless traveler. Her generosity had been impersonal, the satisfying of a whim. She no more expected thanks from him than she would from a starving dog she had ordered to be fed.

  The machine ceased its clicking. Stooping close the woman read the symbols in the transparent windows and frowned. Impatiently she pressed several buttons and slammed her hand on the release. The clicking began again, this time at a higher tempo.

  "A diagnostic machine?" Dumarest had reason to be interested. She guessed his concern.

  "Partially, yes. I have been giving you a routine check. You may be interested to learn that you have no contagious disease, virus infection, malignant growth or organic malfunction. Also that you have no trace of any foreign objects implanted in or on your body." She hesitated. "And I was totally unable to discover any sign of any post-hypnotic suggestion or mental conditioning impressed on your subconscious."

  He relaxed, smiling. "Did that machine tell you all that?"

  "That and more." She glanced at the windows again as the machine fell silent. She frowned, then turned to face him. "There are some questions I would like to ask. I have been studying your physique and encephalogram together with the constituents of your blood and your glandular secretions. I am somewhat puzzled. Where were you born?"

  "Are you saying that I am not wholly human?"

  Impatiently she brushed aside the suggestion. "It isn't that. This machine contains the encoded data of all known physiology down to the molecular level. With the information I have introduced, it should be able to tell me on which world you originated. It has failed to do so. Therefore the machine is either malfunctioning or you originated on a world of which it has no knowledge." She paused. "It is not malfunctioning."

  "Therefore, by your logic, I must originate on a world of which it has no knowledge." Dumarest smiled. "Is that so incredible? There are countless inhabited worlds."

  "Not quite so many—and the machine embraces all that are known."

  Dumarest shrugged. "Assuming that to be true, haven't you overlooked the possibility of mutation?"

  "No. That is not the reason. What is the name of your native world?"

  "Earth."

  She frowned, her lips thinning with anger. "Please do not jest; I am serious. Many races so call the substance of their planet as they call it dirt or soil. What is the name of your primary?"

  "Sol."

  "This is ridiculous!" She rose to her feet, insulted. "I ask you the name of your sun and you reply with a word meaning exactly the same. Sun!" She almost spat the word. "What sun?"

  "The Sun." He rose and smiled down at her, amused by her anger. "I assure you that I am telling the truth."

  She snorted and left the room. After a while he tried to follow and a guard blocked his passage. She was almost as tall as himself. Massive doses of testosterone had accentuated her masculine characteristics. She faced him, one hand resting lightly on the butt of her bolstered weapon.

  "No." Her voice was deep, as strong as her determination. "You are to wait here."

  "Wait? For what?"

  She didn't answer and Dumarest returned to the couch. He lay down, enjoying the softness of the bed, idly studying the motif on the ceiling. He had no objection to being detained in such luxurious surroundings.

  * * *

  The wine was a living emerald flecked with drifting motes of ruby. The goblet was blown from lustrous glass veined with gold. The sweat of condensation clung to the outside in minute droplets of moisture. The liquid was as frigid as polar ice.

  "From Woten," said the girl carelessly. "You have been there?"

  "No." Dumarest sipped at the wine, feeling the chill of it bite his tongue, the potency of it sear his throat. Released by the warmth of his hand the bouquet rose to fill his nostrils with a cloying scent. "It seems a rare vintage, My Lady."

  "Many use it for perfume." Seena Thoth was not interested in the wine. She left her own untouched as she sat facing her guest, her eyes roving over the hard planes of his face, the firm yet sensuous mouth. He seemed different from the ragged savage she had seen kill a man with his bare hands. "You have traveled far?"

  "Yes, My Lady." He wondered why he had been detained for her pleasure. To satisfy her curiosity, of course, but what else? "I have been traveling most of my life. Ever since I left my home planet."

  "Earth?"

  "Yes." He caught her smile. "I told the truth, My Lady."

  "The physician does not think so." She was not really interested in his planet of origin. "You risked your life when you fought Emmened's creature," she said abruptly. "What made you do it?"

  "The prize, My Lady."

  "A thing so small?" Her doubt was genuine. "To risk your life?"

  "Wealth is relative," explained Dumarest patiently. It was obvious that she had never known the desperation of poverty. "It is not a pleasant thing to be stranded on a world such as this."

  "But surely better to be stranded than to be dead? Moidor was a trained fighter of men. He killed the others as I would snap a twig." Her eyes grew speculative. "Are you also a trained fighter of men?"

  "No, My Lady."

  "Then you must have a secret skill. How else did you succeed when the others failed?"

  "The others made mistakes." Dumarest looked at her with critical eyes. She was as beautiful as the goblet, as exciting as the wine. The jewels she had braided in the ebony of her hair must have cost a hundred High passages, the ring on her finger the same. He grew thoughtful as he studied the ring. "They thought it was a game and tried to win according to the rules. That was their mistake. It killed them. In combat there are no rules."

  "Is that why you kicked at his knee?" She smiled, remembering. "I wondered why you had done that."

  "It is hard for a man, no matter how strong or well-trained, to stand on a broken leg. It gave me an advantage the others did not have." Dumarest sipped more of his wine. He could have told her of his other great advantage over the men who had died: they had been conditioned under the benediction-light to respect the Supreme Ethic; they had entered the fight psychologically unable to kill. Instead he said, "Have you ever killed, My Lady?"

  "No."

  "Or caused the death of others?"

  "No." She remembered a tortured face staring at an empty sky; blood on a cone of polished glass. "No!"

  He sensed her trouble and picked up her goblet of wine. "You are not drinking. My Lady."

  She waved aside the goblet. "Tell me what it is to kill," she demanded. "Do dreams come to haunt your sleep? Do you re
gret having taken a life?" lie sipped wine, watching her over the rim of the goblet.

  "Tell me," she ordered, "what it is like to hold a living creature in your hands and—"

  "To kill it?" Dumarest turned and set down his glass. The base made a small sound as it hit the surface of the inlaid table. "It is a matter of survival. You kill because you have no choice. Having no choice makes it unnecessary to regret the inevitable."

  He heard the sudden intake of breath and wondered if he had guessed wrongly. If she had wanted him to supply the vicarious thrill of blood and pain then he had failed. But she hadn't seemed like so many of her class, a depraved animal craving sexual stimulation— and liable to take an unpleasant revenge if she didn't get it. Then he saw her smile.

  "You are right," she said gratefully. "The necessity of killing must be dictated by the needs of survival. I'm glad to hear you say it."

  He knew better than to ask why or question what ghost he had laid to rest. She had wanted to meet a man who had risked his life for what she considered to be a trifle. She had expected nothing, an alleviation of boredom at the most, but Dumarest had surprised her with the impact of his personality. She found herself strangely reluctant to let him go.

  He could have told her why. Despite her wealth and culture she had lived all her life in the narrow strata of a single society. He had trod a hundred worlds, lived a varied life, seen a thousand things of interest. Seena was like the handler on his ship. Her walls were invisible but they existed just the same.

  "You must have more wine," she decided. "Not that cold stuff from Woten but a warmer vintage from the slopes of Segalia on Kund." She rose to fetch the flagon and fresh glasses. "Have you ever been to Kund?"

  "No, My Lady." He watched the grace of her movements across the floor, wondering why she hadn't called a servant to fetch the wine. As she poured he watched her hands.

  "Here!" She handed him a glass with her ringed hand. He took it, then looked sharply into her face. Her eyes were bright, her breathing rapid. "We'll drink a toast," she said. "In celebration of your victory. To the dead—they won't bother us!"