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From: howell_g@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
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Subject: story:Human Memoirs part 7
Date: Sat, 10 Jun 95 22:58:43 +1200
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The Human Memoirs Part 2 Section C
 
 
     The  morning  sun was just starting to shine over  the
wild  hills  on the far side of The Narrows and in through
the  windows  of Tahr's room.
     She lay on the bed,  her bandaged hand resting on the
sheet  that  covered her.  The worst of the blood had been
washed  off,  leaving  enough  to make her look out of
place  among  the  clean  sheets.  From  the time we'd
brought her in she'd laid in  shock,  slipping in and out
of consciousness.
     The physician they called had had to remove the two
fingers,  there was absolutely nothing we could do to save
them.  All I was  able  to  do was to put antiseptic on the
remaining  stumps  and  stand  by with the morphine in case
it was needed.  Afterwards  I  sat and kept an eye on her
as the night passed.
     Morning found her with a fever and delirious.  She
muttered  and moaned in her sleep, her skin, her nose, had
grown hot to the  touch. Through the night she was panting
and thrashing in her sleep, sometimes screaming out. The
several times I heard Tarsha's name I tried to calm her
with cool cloths and water.
     Rehr returned the following morning, fifty hours after
the duel. Fifty hours without sleep. It was the advisior
who  ordered me to go and get  some  rest.  "You  will be
told if she wakes. Now get out of here. Go on, before you
collapse!"
     I  wearily acquiesced and stumbled back to my  room,
almost  knocking  over  one  of the guards who had  been
posted  outside  Tahr's  room.  In my quarters I fumbled
with the buttons of  my  shirt,  but in the end I couldn't
be bothered.  I just fell  onto  the bed, pulled a sheet
up, and was asleep.
     I awoke to sickly light outside. Dawn? My watch  told
me  that  it was 19:32.  Shit! I'd slept most of  the  day
away!  Pausing only to grab an apple and a mouthful of
water,  I double- timed  it  back to Tahr's room,  pushing
past the guards  at  the  door.
     The doctor was carefully packing a bundle of herbs
away into  a  small  bag   as I barged in.  He  look  up
and jumped. "Rot! What is that?!"
     I ignored that. "How is she?"
     He swallowed and said in a small voice ,"What?"
     "What word did you not understand," I growled. "How is
she?"
     "Ah. . . well,  the fever has passed, but she is
still very weak. What ARE you?"
     "Is there anything else you can do?"
     He stared, then waved a 'no'. "I have done all I can,
and I have other patients to attend to. I. . .ah. . .I will
be back later." He picked up the bag and sidled past  me
out of the room, keeping an eye on me until he was out of
the room.
     I  went over to the side of the low bed and looked
down  at  Tahr as she slept.  Someone had cleaned her up;
the clotted blood  had gone and her mane and fur had been
combed out.  The  bandages  on her left hand had been
changed for clean ones. They were doing their best,  but I
would have traded my soul for  a  real  hospital with
proper equipment. I knelt down and touched her mane  where
it pushed over the crown of her head between  her  pointed
ears, then moved my hand down to the damp leather of her
nose; she did feel cooler.
     "You'll be fine."
       I gave her fur a final stroke while wishing I could
feel as certain as I sounded,  then got  up  and  walked
around to the window,  where I leaned against the sill and
watched her; she didn't even twitch.
     Outside  the  window,  an icicle had stretched down
from  a  stone  that  stuck out from the wall above it.  It
acted  like  a  prism on the setting sunlight striking it,
refracting the  light  in  much  the same way as a crystal
would.  Moving  pinpoints  of  light  were formed by water
running down the side of the  icicle,  dangling from the
end,  and either freezing solid or being  blown  away by a
gust of wind.
     Hours  passed,  the  icicle  growing as  the  sun
vanished.  Attendants scurried about the room lighting
lamps and candles.  I  watched the darkness spreading.  A
soft flurry of snow damped any  lights in Mainport.
     "K'hy?
     I almost tripped over my feet turning.  Tahr was
watching me through half- closed eyes.
     "God, you had us worried. How are you feeling?" I sat
down on the side of the bed.
     She closed her eyes before answering.  "Alright I
think. . . "  Her eyes snapped open and she tried to sit
up. "My hand!"
     "Steady. . . lie  back." I gently forced her back down
on  the  bed.  "I  will get you a drink." I patted  her
shoulder  then ducked out to the other room and poured a
mug of water  from  the jug there, at the same time telling
one of the guards outside  her  door to inform Rehr that
Tahr was awake.  When I  got  back,  Tahr  was  resting her
bandaged hand on the sheets  covering  her  chest, her
other hand was gently caressing it.
     "I  have  lost  them,  have  I not." It  was  not
really  a  question.
     I  sat  down  on  the bed  again.  "Yes,  I  am
afraid  you  have. . . but it could have been worse. Here,
try this. . . slowly." I propped her up  as  she  sipped at
the water and set the mug aside when she said  she'd had
enough.
     When  she spoke again,  her question was strange:
"Why  did  Schai spare me?"
     "What?"
     "Why did Schai not kill me? I was. . . it would have
been to easy," she seemed to sag as she said this;
difficult when you're lying down. Before I could answer,
the bedroom door opened  and  Rehr walked in,  slowly and
cautiously,  carrying a small satchel  and closely followed
by the physician.  I got up and went to lean  against the
window sill.
     "Shirai," Rehr bowed respectfully.
     "Rehr,  what  is going on?  Is this some kind  of
joke?"  Tahr demanded, struggling up on her elbows looking
distressed and  confused.
     Rehr was startled at this. "Excuse me, High One?"
     "Tahr,"  I interrupted gently,  "You won.  You now
rule  the  Eastern Realm. . . You won."
     She sank back and looked from Rehr to me,  the doctor
lurked  in  the  background  and  kept  his  mouth  shut.
"I  won?"  she  whispered. I nodded. She closed her eyes
and took a deep breath, then opened them to stare at the
ceiling. "I do  not remember. . . How?"
     Rehr told her.
     Having seen it once already, I didn't need reminding.
I stared out the window while Rehr spoke and tried not to
listen.
     When  he  finished,  there was a silence,  broken
when  the  doctor asked to examine her.
     "There is no need; I feel fine," she protested, not
very  wholeheartedly.  I wondered just how much use it
would be  having  this sawbones examining her,  then
realised that while he may not  know much about the finer
points of medicine,  he could at  least  recognise  what
were good and bad signs in a Sathe.  More than  I  could
do.
     He  took her pulse then her temperature,  touching her
nose  and   holding  his  hand  there  for  a   second.
She   shifted  uncomfortably.   Unwrapping  the  bandages
on  Tahr's  hand,  he  examined  the  stumps where she had
lost the  fingers.  Tahr stared in horified fascination,
then looked away. Living meat, clotted blood and bone. I
felt queezy myself. Tahr  grimaced when the surgeon rubbed
a oily looking salve on them.
     "She  will be alright," he diagnosed.  "Give her rest
and  a  lot of liquid to make up for the blood she lost.
She should  not  do anything too active for the next week
or so." So saying he dropped his little jar of ointment
into a bag. "I will check  on you from time to time," he
said as he left.
     "Is there something you wanted,  Rehr?" Tahr asked
after the  physician had gone.
     "There  were a couple of matters of state that I
wished  to  discuss,"  he  replied.  "There are the matter
of  the  Succession  Honours."
     "Rehr,  I am tired.  I do not think that I would be
able  to  make  the best decisions at the moment.  Is it so
urgent that  it  cannot wait until the morning?"
     "I suppose they can wait High One.  I will let you
rest." He  backed out the door and pulled it closed behind
him.
     "I had best leave as well then," I said and started to
move  toward the door. Tahr stopped me.
     "No K'hy.  That was just to get rid of him." She
patted  the  bed beside her.  "Here.  sit." I did so.  She
coughed and touched  her  bandaged hand.  "I am sorry that
you had to see  that,"  she  said. "But it was your
choice."
     "I know," I nodded. "You did not have much of a
choice."
     "But you still cannot get used to it, can you?" she
said.
     "No, I suppose I cannot."
     "It is strange," she mused.  "You have killed almost a
dozen  times, yet you say that death disturbs you."
     "It is a lot easier to kill someone when they are
trying  to  kill  you  than  to  sit and watch  someone
tear  out  another's  throat," I said.
     "Yes,  and  this  time I was the one who had to kill
or  be  killed," Tahr replied. "As you said: I had little
choice in the matter."
     I ran a hand through my hair. "I know. I cannot help
it."
     "Enough  about that," she raised and dropped  her
uninjured  hand on the sheet,  as though chopping the
previous  conversation  off  short.  "Do you think there is
any chance of  these  growing  back again?" She lifted her
bandaged hand.
     I shook my head. "No. I am sorry."
     "Huh,"  she  snorted  and glared at the hand as  if
it  had  offended her.
     "But  your wound is clean and should heal well," I
tried  to  console  her.  "Just  keep it clean;  make sure
that  anyone  who  touches  it while it heals has clean
hands and boil any  bandages  before using them. It will be
fine."
     "Yes,  our doctors know to keep wounds and sores
clean. . . but  why boil bandages? You had me do that, for
your chest."
     I  tried to explain about microbes,  viruses,  but my
heart  wasn't  really in it.  There were other  concerns.
Still,  it  seemed  to help Tahr take her mind of the pain
in  her  arm.  She  listened attentively, grimacing
occasionally.
     When I finished she grinned at me; pained. "What I
wouldn't give for one of your physicians. Saaa. . . Your
home sounds like  a  dream: a world free of disease."
     I shifted and shrugged.  "In some places,  yes. . .
others, no.  There are Realms that are more advanced and
wealthy than  others.  The wealthier ones have destroyed
many disease,  in other  places  the poor suffer from the
most common of them. Some people in more  isolated  areas
were given the knowledge to let them  and  their  children
live longer,  but before they could use it properly. Now
there  is  starvation and drought in many areas where
there  are  more people than the land can support.
     "And we are not free of diseases. There is one that
recently  appeared. It lingers in the body, then kills.  We
have no cure for it and more forms of it are appearing all
the  time. Last I heard about sixty million humans were
infected, most  of them from the poorer Realms."
     For  a while the only sound was the wind howling
around  the  walls of the Citadel.  "I have been here long
enough,  you should  rest." I patted her shoulder as I got
up to leave.
     Just  as I put my hand on the door latch,  she
stopped  me:  "You are not too disgusted by me are you?"
     I shook my head, then grinned.  "I guess I will have
to learn  to put up with you, disgusting as you are."
     "Get out of here!"
     As I pulled the door shut behind me, I heard a brief
hiss of  laughter.
 
 ******
 
     I ate my dinner in the great hall,  sitting at the end
of  one of the long tables with my legs stuck out to the
side. The furniture hadn't been built with my frame in
mind.
     The Sathe at the table watched me curiously as I ate.
I was  used to their bolting chunks of food,  but to them,
taking small  bites  and  chewing  them thoroughly would
be  most  unusual.  I  finished off the meal loaf I was
eating and washed the dry, half- stale  bread down with a
swig of water from the wrong side  of  a  mug, much to the
amusement of my table companions.
     One  of them seemed a little too amused,  was
laughing  too  loudly  and his voice was slurred as he
called  out,  "Hai,  Ugly  One!"
     I kept drinking.
     "Ugly One! Shave-face! Yes, you!"
     I lowered my mug and weighed him up. Not very big,
just an oversized mouth. Too drunk. Yeah, the last time I'd
seen drunk Sathe it'd been a rape. Did they always lose it
that  bad? I hoped not. "My name is Kelly."
     He hissed and sputtered into his mug. A silence began
to travel around the table like a row of tumbling dominoes
as Sathe stopped their conversations. "As ridiculous as the
rest of you. Look, Bald One, you do not even know the right
way to hold a drink!"
     I drummed my fingers, beginning to get annoyed.
     He grinned. "Were your parents as deformed as you?"
     THAT did it. I froze, then turned to him and smiled.
It wasn't a nice smile. "All right, what do you have on
your mind? If you will pardon the exaggeration."
     He opened his mouth, then frowned and cocked his head
to one  side? "What?"
     "Deaf as well as an idiot," I shook my head. "Well,
what you lack in intelligence, you more than make up for in
stupidity."
     There was a hissing of laughter from others,  and the
Sathe  who had spoken took a while to get it. When he did,
he bristled -  literally  -  and  started  to  reach  for
something  at his belt.  One  of  his  comrades grabbed
his  hand  and  whispered  something;  the fire went out of
his eyes.  He was helped out  of  the room, none to steady
on his feet.
     Well, that could have gone worse. Didn't even have to
fight. I  looked around at the Sathe staring at me.
"Everyone's  a  critic," I growled and finished my meal in
peace.
     That kind of thing is one of the reasons I don't eat
out that  often. It's also the kind of thing that can play
on your mind. The walk back to my quarters gave my mind
plenty of time for playing, so I was pretty wrapped up in
my own thoughts when a Sathe stepped out before  me.
"Shit!"
      "Sir?"
     I  knew I'd seen him somewher before. "You are. . .
Hrach?" I asked.
     "H'rrasch,  High One," he corrected. Oh yeah, the
young male  who'd sparred with Tahr in the exercise rooms.
He was fidgeting,  his  eyes locked on me with iris black
and wide.  "You have  seen  T. . . uh, the Shirai have you
not, sir?"
     "No 'sir' please," I smiled, "I do not think I deserve
that.  Yes, I have seen her."
     He   looked  uncomfortable,   clearing  his  throat
before  speaking. "Huh. . . uh, how is she? She was hurt
badly. I heard. . . "
     "She will be fine," I forestalled him.  "She is just
resting at the  moment."
     He looked as if a weight had been lifted from his
shoulders.  That  look  was  more than just a loyal
soldier  would  have.  I  studied him thoughtfully and he
squirmed. "Do you need to see her  about something?" I
asked.
     "I   thought. . . she  might  remember. . . "  he
trailed   off,  clenching his hands.
     I smiled, "She is beautiful, is she not?"
     He looked up at me and I swear his eyes seemed to
glow,  "Yes, she is. . . "  Then he appeared to realize
what  he  was  saying and who he was saying it to.  "Uh. .
 yes sir. Thank you sir. I am sorry I disturbed you."
     "Anytime." I replied automatically.  Watching his back
as he  disappeared down the corridor,  I broke into a grin.
Seems  like  Tahr has got herself a not-so-secret admirer.
     I  was  in my room later that  evening,  practising
on  the  harmonica I had acquired aboard Hafair's ship.
Why was it I only  felt  able  to  work  melancholic  airs
that  night?   My   solo  performance came to an end when
guard appeared at my door, saying  Tahr wanted to see me.
I reluctantly left the relative warmth of  my room and
followed her.
     Tahr  was still bedriddden,  propped up by a  small
mound  of  pillows. A glowing oil lamp  threw dull-redish
light on pieces of paper scattered on the sheets in front
of her: some covered with the bird scratchings of Sathe
writing  and others with what looked like maps. She wasn't
alone: In a chair beside the bed a piece of night turned
around and stared at me with wide green eyes. I stared
back. It was a Sathe, a female, but her fur was black. .
or a brown so near black it didn't make much difference.
I'd seen her around before, but she'd always kept her
distance.
     A snort from Tahr interrupted our mutual scrutiny. She
waved a hand as she made the introductions:  "Remae,  this
is K'hy,  my escort and friend.  K'hy, this is  Remae,
[Marshal] of the Eastern Realm's forces."
     I  bowed my head to her,  and she uncertainly
returned  the  gesture,  then she turned to Tahr. "Do you
really think that. . . he  may be able to help?" she asked.
     "I  hope so," Tahr replied.  "K'hy,  look at these.
Do  you  recognize them? The area?"
     She handed me several rough maps of the eastern
seaboard  of  America  and Canada,  and the area around the
Mississippi  and  the  Gulf of Mexico. So, this was going
to be a geography lesson?
     "I recognise them."
     "Do you know where Mainport is?"
     Where Mainport was was there; a triangle drawn in
green ink.  I pointed it out.
     "Very good.  This area,  from the tip of the Swamp
Lands, up  along the far side of the Sky Scratcher
mountains and ending in a line from the Great Lakes to the
Eastern Sea.  "Many of  these  names  were  new to me,  but
I translated them as best  I  could,  surprised that the
Sathe also called those lakes bordering Canada  the Great
Lakes.
     Tahr continued:  "The Gulf Realm lies here, on the
southern coastline, from the Borderline River extending
down the peninsula  here,  and  up the Slow River here.
Their capitol - Riverport  -  lies  here,"  she pointed out
the spot where New  Orleans  should  have been.
     "Here,  northeast  of the Eastern Realm are three more
Clan  lands. This area around the Great lakes is the domain
of the Lake  Traders." She traced the area out with the
crescent of a claw.
     "They  are actually two seperate Realms with an
ancient  bond  of  allegiance between them.  Alone, they
are small, but together they  are as large as the Gulf
Realm, and much larger than us.
     "On the far side of the Sky Scratchers is the Open
Realm. It  is  probably  the largest realm in sheer size,
but in  terms  of  cultivated and inhabited lands,  cities
and the like,  it is  the  smallest and weakest realm."
     "Open Realm. Why that name?" I asked.
     "Because  of the vast plains that make up most of it,"
Tahr  explained.
     "Oh."
     Tahr  put  the  maps back on the bed,  and  picked
out  one  particular one. "Remae, explain to him  what has
been happening,"  she  handed the map to the Marshal,  then
sank back  against  the  cushions,  curled  her legs up
under the sheets,  and closed  her  eyes.
     "Shirai,   you  are  prepared  to  continue?"  Remae
leaned  forward, concerned.
     Tahr opened her eyes again. "I am fine, just tired."
     Remae's  ears  flickered with worry.  "Should  I  have
some  Thamil brought in? It would help relax you."
     "Uh. . . " I started to speak, but Tahr beat me.
     "No," she gave me a smile,  a small flicker of her
ears. "We  want to talk to K'hy, not listen to his
snoring."
     Remae looked confused. "I do not understand."
     "Do not concern yourself. . . No,  no Thamil now. . .
maybe later.  Now tell him."
     Remae blinked.  In the dim light,  it was as if her
eyes had  flashed  off and on again,  she held the map
while I peered  over  her shoulder. I could see she was
nervous having me so close, her  ears  were at full alert
and opalescent claws poked  indentations  in the paper.
     "Over  the  past  few months,"  she  began,  "small
Eastern  villages, outposts,  and caravans around  this
area have been attacked, most destroyed completely." She
pointed out an area covering the lower Appalachian
mountains  -  the  Sky Scratchers - down the Appalachicola
river in Georgia  to  the Gulf of Mexico.
     "The smaller towns on our side of the  Borderline
River  have been raided, with crops burned, outlying
farmsteads looted, Sathe killed. The Gulf Realm claims that
settlements  on  their side have been attacked."
     Uh-huh. I had an inkling where this was leading. I
scratched  my chin and asked, "Who has been doing the
raiding? Bandits?"
     The black Sathe looked surpirsed. "Ahh, the survivors
say bandits.  But bandits do not usually  attack  armed
convoys,  nor  garrison towns.  And these bandits did  not
fight  like  bandits: they were too well trained and
equipped."
     I remembered being bound and helpless in the back of a
wagon  by  Sathe  soldiers wearing tattered cloaks
concealing  red  and  black armour. I said so.
     "Yes,  the Shirai has told us as much," Remae
replied.  "We know they are smuggling troops into our
borders, we just cannot prove anything."
     "Why?" I asked.
     "We have never been able to catch them."
     "No. I mean why are they doing this?"
     "War seems most likely," she grimaced. "Internal
upset.  Disrupt supplies to outpost  settlements.  Destroy
food supplies. Spy on our resources. Propaganda.  They will
probably complain to the other realms that  we are not able
to conduct our own affairs. They will insist upon sending a
'peacekeeping' force across the Borderline, posting troops
in key areas such as river crossings, major towns,
seaports.  That would  put them in an excellent position
for an invasion.  With the river  crossings  already
controlled, they would be able to move more troops into our
Realm virtuable unopposed."
     She bared her teeth in a snarl at the implications of
that.  "The  Gulf  forces  would bite off a major chunk of
us before any  of  the  other  Realms could send aid, even
if they deign to assist us.
     "But at the moment, the bandits are our greatest
worry. They  strike and are gone before we can get soldiers
there." A frown creased her face, "It is  not  an
honourable  way to fight a war. Aside from disrupting
traffic across the Realm they  are  causing  much  death,
destruction, and fear amongst innocent people."
     Guerilla Warfare  I thought.
     Aloud I said. "You said that I may be able to help. .
 how?"
     Tahr looked both awkward and hopeful at once, "Do you
know of anything that might help us?"
     I sighed.  I had been kind of expecting this.
"Weapons and such? Yes."
     "What about finding those supurating bandits? You have
had experience with that kind before?"
     "I know of them," I admitted. "We have the same kind
of fighting back home. Same kind of problems. All you can
do is be smarter or stronger. Difficult. Send oldiers with
the present caravans,  even make  entire  fake caravans to
lure them out and trap them."
     Remae tapped her leg with a clawtip. "Yes, we HAD
thought of  that."
     "Well,  I might think of something more original.
Tahr," I looked to her and held out my hands helplessly, "I
am not a genius. I cannot do the impossible. I can give you
some ideas and new tools, but working wonders is not my
field. . .my expertise. All I can do is the best I can."
     Tahr's ears flickered and she gave me a pleased grin.
"I know. That is all we ask. Thank  you, K'hy. You will
have all the aid we can give you."
     I smiled back. "Thank you. Oh, and a merry christmas
to you."
 
******
 
     I  started  to learn the tactics the Sathe used  in
battle.  They were simple to the point of ridicule: not
really so different from the way we did it a few hundred
years back.
     The opposing sides would meet each other on an open
field and combat would take place in much the same way it'd
done in  the human middle ages.  Archers would soften up
the  enemy with long-range fire. As the forces closed upon
each other,  the archers stopped firing because of the
chances of hitting  one  of  their own.  After that things
started to break down: communications were lost, units
seperated and the battle was left  up  to  the  individual
soldier with his or her sword.
     Disorganised  and  chaotic with much loss of blood  on
both  sides.
     I watched the Citadel guard drilling in the exercise
hall. I examined their swords.
     I saw something that threatened to really screw my
plans up.
     The Sathe used their light swords two-handed.  Okay, I
had noticed that, but I hadn't realized why.
     Humans  are descended from apes;  brachiating
creatures  who  are  at home hanging from branches.  Apes'
hands are  crude,  but  they  are built for grasping.  Even
a chimp has a powerful  grip,  much more powerful than a
human's but without the finese.
     Sathe  are descended from (no prizes  for  guessing),
cats. Probably some kind of large hunting cat, maybe the
bobcat or puma, it doesn't really matter. I don't know how
it happened, but  somewhere  in  the  convolutions  of
evolution,   Sathe  started  manipulating things.
     Starting  from  paws they had a lot further to go
than  the  apes of my world,  and even now they lack the
grip that my simian  ancestry has given me. With their
claws and speed, they never had  to rely upon being able to
grip a tree branch or weapon to escape  from or fight
predators,  and it is only with the development  of  their
tools that they had need of a strong grip.
     But their grip was not as strong as is needed to swing
a sword  one  handed and hold against the shock as it meets
an  opponent's  blade,  armour,  or  flesh.  With  two
hands  they  were  wicked  swordsmen,  but  they were
incapable of holding a shield  at  the  same time as their
scimitars.
     I trashed my plans of skirmish lines based upon the
ancient  Roman and Greek ranks  and started anew.
 
 ******
 
     The target mounted on the straw bales at the far end
of  the  hall settled between the V of the modified sights.
I squeezed the  trigger,  and without waiting to see if the
quarrel would hit the  target,  braced the cross bow
against my hip and pulled the lever  that  re-cocked it.
As the bow-string caught on the  catch  that  held  it
back,  another  quarrel dropped  into  place  from  the
magazine.  I  raised the bow and fired,  repeating the
operation  several times.
     Remae  and  several others whom I had been told  were
other  high  ranking  Sathe officials and Clan Lords stood
off  to  the  side,  their breath turning into small clouds
on the chill air in  the hall. They  eyed the target and
looked fairly impressed.
     One  of the Sathe,  a scholar by the name of Sthrae
stepped  forward  to  speak.  He could say and express
ideas  that  I  had  trouble saying in Sathe.  "Imagine
archers armed with these bows.  They can fire several times
as fast as a normal crossbow. Imagine  what a toll they
would take upon infantry."
     There was a brief conversation between the officials
on  the  side, before Remae called out. "Continue."
     "Of  course." Sthrae bent over and picked up a  sack,
pulling  out  the next item.  The chain metal links rattled
and  glittered  dully  in the light coming through the
windows along the  top  of  the hall.  He gave it to me and
I carried it over to the watching  Sathe, they tensed as I
came near.
     "This is a type of armour that you do not have,
Sthrae  has  called it link-armour." I handed the chain-
mail hauberk to Remae.  She turned it over in her hands,
flexing the steel links.
     "Is this worn as it is?" one of the other Sathe,  a
grizzled  looking veteran, asked.
     "It can be worn like that, but is more effective over
leather  armour," I said.  "Padding helps: It stops the
links pinching the  flesh, although I think that will not
be so much of a problem for  Sathe."
     There were a few smiles.
     I had been thinking about a suit of plate-mail armour.
With  a few modifications in the design and materials,  I'd
be able  to both cut down on the weight and make it
tougher. I'd decided against it. The  Sathe favoured their
speed over a lot of armour.  After  all,  if  you can't be
hit, then there's no need for hot, clumsy armour.
     Devices such as the five metre long pikes and halberds
they'd never seen before.  The long pole arms  had  simple
leather straps a Sathe soldier could sling  over  his
shoulder to help him hold the unwieldy wooden poles.  They
found  these interesting, especially the news that a
formation of these were practically invulnerable to attack
by swordsmen, but the real pihce de risistance had no
blades.
     I  unwrapped  the  bulky cloth bundle  and  sorted
out  its  contents.  The airtight ceramic and steel-bound
cylinders I slung  over  my shoulders on their straps.
There was a  metal  tube  that  stuck out the bottom of the
right cylinder and then made  a  ninety degree turn and
continued on for another sixty centimetres  before  ending
in  a tapering nozzle with  a  simple  mechanical
mechanism attached to it. I tucked this nozzle under my
right arm  so that it stuck out in front of me.
     "High  Ones,  if you would kindly move back. . . " a
couple  of  guards ushered the watching Sathe officials
back to what I  hoped  was a safe distance.
     My  hands were steady enough as I lit the small  taper
that  stuck out in front of the nozzle and opened a valve
on the  pipe;  we had tested this before, but something
could still go wrong. Too wrong and they'd be scraping me
off the walls with a spatula.
     I  advanced on the target,  the bale of straw,  until
I  was  about  six  metres away,  then I took a breath and
squeezed  the  trigger.
     The  stream of compressed methane,  oil,  and coal tar
shot  from  the muzzle in a pressurized stream,  igniting
as it  passed  over  the taper,  and flying in a blazing
orange-blue arc to  the  target.
     Three  more two second shots,  each blast of flame
throwing  dancing light on the walls, floor, and
spectators. When I lowered  the sputtering muzzle of the
flame thrower, the bale of straw was  a pillar of flame
dancing up towards the roof, sparks floating up  and
extinguishing themselves before reaching the huge timbers
of  the rafters.
     I  turned  back  toward  the  Sathe  spectators,  my
shadow  flickering and wavering in front of me.  Snuffing
out the taper,  I shrugged out of  the  harness  and let
the riveted cylinders fall to the floor  with  a  metallic
clang.
     The  Sathe were staring at the pyre behind  me,  their
eyes  wide and filled with the sparks that danced behind
me. I couldn't  tell if they were delighted, overawed, or
shocked.
     "You asked for a weapon. . . you got it."
     Not  waiting around for an answer,  I tucked my hands
in  my  pockets and walked out,  still feeling the heat
from the fire  on  my back.
 
******
 
      There was a tower in the citadel,  not one of the
highest,  but  it  still  commanded  a complete  view  of
Mainport  below.  Occasionally,  a guard on punishment
detail huddled in the lee of  a merlon,  but more often
than not the tower was deserted.  As it  was now.
     It  was  a place I could go whenever I wanted to  be
alone.  Maybe that sounds strange coming from someone who
is about  alone  as one is ever going to get,  but it was
another kind of solitude  I sought.
     I  leaned on the embrasure between the teeth of the
merlons  and  watched the activity on the streets below
slowly die as  the  shadows drew longer. The temperature
hovered around three degrees  celsius,  it  would have been
colder if it weren't for  the  wind  that  whirled  and
twisted through the walls and turrets  of  the  Citadel.
     Wrapping  my  cloak a bit tighter around  my
shoulders  and  settling the hood, I watched as the setting
sun tried to beat its  way  through  the  layers of granite
cloud  that  blockaded  the  western horizon, backlighting
them with a corona of orange.
     I've  always loved sunsets.  Usually  they're
restful,  but  tonight. . .
     "Do you often come up here?"
     I  jumped,  turning,  then relaxed when I saw who'd
spoken.  "So they let you out."
     "It took a bit of persuasion,"  Tahr smiled. "I had
begun to wonder if I was Clan Lord or prisoner."
     "How did you find me?"
     She adjusted her own cloak and propped a shoulder
against the grey stone of the ramparts.  "You are  not
exactly inconspicuous,  K'hy.  I just had to ask." Green
eyes  looked out at the clouds - now faded to a dull
magenta - and  her  mane  whipped in the wind.  She brushed
it back out of  her  eyes  with her right hand,  the left
one still swathed in bandages.  "I  want to thank you for
what you have given us."
     I didn't reply.
     She reached up and took my chin between two fingers,
turning  my head, studying my expression. "You are upset. .
 why?"
     I  jerked my head out of her hands and stared fiercely
back  at the alien world disappearing into the night. "I
thought it was  obvious." I turned away from  the  view
and  leaned  against the solid,  wind-worn  granite of  the
merlo, watching Tahr.   She looked as if  she  fitted
there;  standing on top of a tower amid small  drifts  of
blown  snow,  the  wind sending her mane into  periodic
flurries  about her head. I continued:
     "Those weapons will be used, will they not?. . . of
course they  will," I sighed. "So in a way I will be
responsible for the death  or injury of everyone that those
things are used against."
     Tahr gave a quiet sigh,  betrayed by the mist that
condensed  in front of her nostrils.  "Yes, that is not a
thought that gives  me  great  joy,  but they are for the
protection  of  the  Realm.  Surely that counts for
something?"
     I nodded curtly.  "That was why I gave them to you.  I
owe  you  Tahr,  but  I do not know whether that justifies
making new ways to kill people. I think I have started
something  terrible."
     "It cannot be that bad, can it?" she tried to soothe
me.
     "Dammit  Tahr,  have you ever thought about what it
would be  like to be burned to death? To be maimed for life
by flame? I had  a  friend who died by fire,  I saw his
body." I shuddered at  the  memory.
     "From these will probably come bigger weapons,  able
to kill  at  greater distances.  You will make a fire that
cannot  be  put  out, even under water it will burn to the
bone."
     Tahr opened her mouth to say something,  but I got my
say in  before her,  "In my world, entire towns were burned
to the ground  by this flame:  Buildings,  animals,  trees,
males, females, and  children.  The stuff was dropped by
flying machines in a  blanket  that covered and destroyed
everything below.
     "If you think that you will be able to keep it a
secret, it will not work. The idea is too simple. My Realm
developed  the  most  powerful type of weapon that my world
has. They thought that  they  could keep it to themselves.
Within a few years, the rest of the  world also had these
weapons."
     I let her think about that.
     K'hy," she finally said, "It was your choice. If you
really  felt so strongly about it, why did you give it to
us?"
     I slapped my palm against rock; once lightly, again
harder.  "I said I  owed  you.  You needed a weapon to help
you, I give you that. I thought that they would be too
limited to be of too much use.  I could not give  you  the
secret of my gun. . . " I broke off. I'd begun something
that I didn't really want brought up.
     She  came up to me and leaned against my  side.  "You
could  not. . . or would not? "
     I didn't answer. She prodded. "K'hy? Please tell me."
     Goddamn,  could I trust her for something that could
be  the  pivotal  point to the future of her Realm;  life
or death of  her  people? I wasn't sure.
     Maybe she read my mind.  "Please, K'hy, you can trust
me. It  will go no further than these ears."
     "My  weapon,  can  be far more. . . deadly than  any
fire. . . " I  choked off.
     She  looked down at the town,  now lying dormant
beneath  a  growing  cloak  of darkness.  The suns rays
were just  a  glimmer  behind  the  clouds,  "You would not
want to be  responsible  for  that. . . I do not think I
would either."
     "Someone will discover it, you can be sure of that.
Then you  will be able to kill each other all you like."
     Her  eyes  opened wide in shock and I realized  what
I  had  said.
     "Tahr. . . I  did not mean that." I stuttered. I
wanted to say something, to take it back, but the words
failed me. I just hugged her close and hard.  I could feel
her claws tense and then relax against  my  back as the fur
on her muzzle tickled against my neck.
     Still pressed against my chest,  she touched my cheek.
"You  are as cold as a stone!  Come, let us get you into
the warmth." A  claw snagged my sleeve, and she led me
toward the stairs.
 
******
 
     Selected  Sathe trained with the new  weapons,
getting  the  feel  of  them and learning techniques and
strategies  that  may  someday save their lives.  I shared
my time between the  exercise  hall  where  most  of  the
training  was  carried  out,  and  the  workshops where
work was being carried out on the flame throwers.
     I  wasn't  satisfied with the strength of the
cylinders  in  which the pressurised, volatile mixture was
carried, and I wanted  more  tests carried out on the
safety valve intended  to  prevent  blowbacks.  If one of
those throwers exploded,  there wouldn't be  enough  left
of  the operator to pick up with  tweezers  and  an
electron microscope.
     The  dashing  to  and fro between the  two  places
left  me  totally  exhausted  at the end of each day,  but
the  effort  was  paying off.
     After a couple of weeks,  the pike-Sathe were becoming
quite  adept  at  using the long unwieldy weapons.  They
could  form  a  skirmish line and hold it steady. While
retreating or wheeling to  face  an  imaginary  charge on
an exposed  flank,  they  kept  in  perfect formation, the
swordsmen and archers spaced in among them  moving to stay
in their positions.
     Buckles  and  other  pieces of  loose  metal
clattered  and  clinked as they manoeuvred, pike and
swordsmen crouching to allow  the archers to fire volleys
over their shoulders,  then  standing  and awaiting orders.
     Their commanding officer drove them hard,  but finally
told  the  weary troops to fall out.  He noticed me
watching  from  the  shadows  of  the  cloister that ran
around  the  outside  of  the  training  hall  and started
in my  direction.  I  recognized  his  scarred face from a
distance.
     "They  are much improved," I told S'sahr as he fiddled
with  the straps of his battered practice armour.
     He gave me a weary smile.  "They have had a lot of
practice, but  with all these new weapons and tactics,  it
is hard for them  and  us." The 'us' must have meant the
officers. He snorted then: "We have only a little more idea
of what we are doing than they do."
     He  opened a door and stepped through,  holding it
open  for  me;  I had to duck my head to get through the
Sathe sized portal.  The room long, narrow room was filled
with the stuff they used in  combat practice: wooden swords
by the barrel-load, blunt and bent  arrows, basic leather
armour hung from pegs on the walls.
     "Why did you not go with Tahr on her parade the other
day?"  S'sahr asked as he pulled off his brass-studded
leather skirt and  scarred cuirass.
     A couple of days ago, Tahr had gone down to the town,
amidst  great  pomp  and  pomposity.  She told me that it
was  a  P.  R.  exercise,  showing the people that she was
alive and well.  I had  watched  from  the Citadel as the
procession made it's way  on  a  roundabout route through
the streets of Mainport, Sathe thronging  to see it.
     "I  am not really sure," I shrugged.  "I think that
she  did  not want me seen by the townspeople."
     S'sahr's one ear gave a flicker of amusement as he
grabbed a  pair  of  breeches from where they hung amongst
several  others.  "K'hy,  there  are rumours all over
Mainport that the Shirai  has  her own,  personal monster.
I do not see why she would not  want  you to be seen. . .
you are not very fearsome."
     I  leaned back against a handy post,  "I seem to
remember  a  certain Sathe who was scared shitless when he
was, uh, introduced  to me."
     He  tightened  his waistband and gathered up  his
dark  blue  cloak. "I was taken by surprise," he sniffed.
     I  laughed  out loud and he looked  at  me  curiously,
then  snorted in an aloof manner;  S'sahr, captain of the
guard was not  used to being laughed at.
     As  we walked down to the wide central courtyard I
listened  while  S'sahr told me how the training of the
various  companies  was going.  They were making slow but
steady  progress,  adapting  the tactics that I remembered
from my history class,  as well  as  adding their own.  I
listened,  but there was very little I could  actually
contribute.
     We  parted company in the courtyard.  He headed off
towards  the  outer  walls and his stations,  and as I made
my  way  back  towards my room,  I realized that I had a
little free time on  my  hands,  so  I  ignored  the stairs
that led to  my  quarters  and  instead headed for the
baths.
     As the weather had grown colder, so the baths had
grown more  crowded.  Heads - and maybe a few stomachs -
still turned when  I  entered one of the bathrooms, but by
now most of the patrons only  gave me a cursory glance when
I entered.
     There was,  however,  still muted talk between others.
That  and  the  fact  that the baths were  unisex,  made
it  the  more  embarrassing.  However,  the  warmth that
seeped through my  cold  body from the water made it worth
the trouble.
     With  my hair still damp,  I stoked up the fire in my
room,  and  headed  for the bedroom,  rubbing at my hair
with  a  coarse  towel.  I'd eaten and bathed and was
feeling comfortably warm and  tired. The circular bed
creaked slightly as I collapsed on it and  pulled the heavy
sheets up to my chest.
     Outside was still,  the moon just a ghostly glow
behind  the  clouds. There was scarcely  enough light
coming through the windows to  cast a shadow from the
window's lattice  across the floor and the  'foot'  of the
bed.  I found myself wondering if I had  done  the  right
thing with the weapons,  for the hundredth time,  before  I
dropped off.
 
******
 
     The  first sensation I was aware of was my  head
throbbing,  feeling  as though it had swollen to twice its
normal  size.  The  next was the pain as I tried to lift my
hands to my head.
     Muscles  that  had been tied in one position  for  too
long  screamed and protested as I tried to move. I couldn't
budge.
     My  knees were up against my chest,  my arms wrapped
around  them,  wrists tied to ankles. I was naked and
freezing and gagged  with a saliva-sodden rag shoved in my
mouth and tied in place.
     I was lying on my side, crammed into a tiny,  wooden,
straw-lined space barely large enough for me.  Shafts of
light danced in through gaps  between the planks. Creakings
and the rumbling of wheels could be  heard  and  occasional
bumps jolted me.  I could hear  the  muted  sound  of
Sathe  voices,  but  the  words  were  muffled  beyond
comprehension.
     Trying to struggle free of the ropes proved useless,
my arms  were stiff and sore from the unnatural position
and hard  boards.  The ropes were tightly tied and a lot
thicker than they needed to  be.
     Unable to move at all,  I lay there and  suffered,
confused  and scared shitless. It was hours before the
rattling and bumping  slowed, then stopped.
     There was a pause,  then the sound of bolts being
drawn.  A  hatch above me was flung open and I clenched my
eyes shut against  the light that poured in on me.  Furry
hands grabbed me,  holding  my  head and yanking the gag
out. I gasped air and something was shoved into my mouth,
water went down my windpipe. I choked and coughed, spraying
water.
     "Drink, rot you!"
     I managed several mouthfuls, then the water was
withdrawn and something  that smoked was passed  under  my
nose.  I  recognized the sweet, pungent odour and tried to
pull back; tried  to hold my breath.
     The  hands  held me fast,  claws  puncturing  my
skin,  and  eventually I had to breath.
     After  several  choking  breaths  the  world  floated
into  pinkness,  spun  a  few  times,  then spiralled  down
and  away.  Blackness swam over me.
 
******
 
     Groaning out loud,  I woke.  A migraine that had to be
the  granddaddy of all headaches pounded in my skull. I was
frozen, the uncontrollable shivering doing nothing to help
the pulsing in  my  temples.  Trying  to move,  coarse hemp
rasped against  my  skin,  straw or grass rustled and poked
at me.
     "Look. It moved."
     "It is waking. Go tell the commander. Go!"
     My  hands  were  tied behind me and  my  ankles  were
bound  together. The gag was still firmly in place. I felt
hands tugging  at  the  ropes,  testing them.  My eyelids
stuck and ached  as  I  forced them open and squinted at my
surroundings
     A Sathe snarled and hissed in my face.
     I gave a muffled yelp through the gag.
     She moved to crouch down at my feet,  her hands on the
hilt  of  a  sword resting tip-down on the dirt floor,  and
gave  me  a  glistening grin. "You behave. No trouble."
     I tried to say, fuck you!
     "Mmmphhh mmmphh!"
     When she growled again and stood up,  I caught a
glimpse  of  the  red  and black armour she wore underneath
her green cloak.
     I shuddered violently, not entirely from the cold,
twisted my hands against the ropes. No go.
     Where was I?  It looked like a. . . stable?  A
stable. There was that permeating smell of  animals  and
damp  straw,  the  bleat of a  llama  came  from  a
neighbouring  stall.  Heavy wooden rafters supported  the
gabled  roof, all  held together with wooden pegs.  What
little light  there  was had to fight its way through
chinks in the  walls.  Opposite the stall I lay in,
several  stools  sat around a rickety table covered with
scraps  of  food.  Blankets  were  spread out on the dirt
floor.  The  Sathe  guard  settled  herself  on a stool,
leaned back against the  wall  and  watched me intently as
I shivered. It was literally freezing.
     Minutes  dragged themselves by on  broken  legs.
Eventually  there was the sound of voices: ". . . paid when
we see it."
     "I assure you it is fine."
     "And nobody saw you?"
     "Nobody, High One."
     Shadows  fell  across me as several Sathe appeared at
my  stall.  Four  of them:  three dressed in the red and
black armour of  the  Gulf Realm, the other wearing an
ordinary dun cloak.
     One  of  the armoured ones sported the gold chevrons
of  an  officer  on his cuirass.  He eyed me,  then turned
to the  guard.  "Kas, has it done anything?"
     "Kicked around a bit, sir. Tried the ropes."
     Shit! She'd noticed. Not too slack.
     "Huh!" The officer turned back to me,  looking at me
like  I  was a particularly suspicious lump in his stew. He
kicked my foot  and I growled back.
     "Well,  it seems to be in good condition. Here," he
pulled a  pouch from his belt and tossed it to the civilian
in the cloak, "you  earned it."
     The  cloaked  Sathe snatched it out of the  air  and
poured  pieces  of gold into his palm,  counting them.
Him.  He was  the  bastard  who'd  snatched me!  If I ever
caught up with  him  he'd  begin a new career as a fur hat!
     Oblivious  to my glare he tipped the gold back into
the  bag  and  bowed,  "Thank you High One.  It has been a
pleasure  doing  business with you."
     "Likewise," the officer snorted. "Get out of here!"
     The  cloaked sathe scampered off,  leaving the  other
three  staring  down  at me.  The female guard sat at the
table  in  the  background, watching with interest.
     The Gulf officer then casually squatted by my head,
studying  me  with  interest before he yanked the gag out.
I sucked air, watching him while he watched me. "Tell  me
your  name," he said.
     Shivering violently, I clamped  my mouth shut. It
stopped my teeth rattling.
     Smoothly,  before  I could react,  his hand darted
out  and  grabbed my hair.  I yelped as my head was forced
back then  froze  when  his claws began tickling my throat.
"Now," he continued,  unruffled. "You CAN talk. You know it
and I know it. Tell me your  name."
     He  wouldn't kill me.  He'd gone to too much trouble
to  get  his paws on me. He wasn't going to kill me. . .
     A  minute  later I was writhing and choking in pain on
the  stable  floor,  something  moist trickling down the
side of my  throbbing  face. He raised his hand again, the
claws peeking out. I tried to cower away and the hand came
down and took another fistful of hair, forcing me to look
up at him.
     "Your name!" he hissed.
     I licked my lips,  tasting blood. My nose ached,
bubbled when I breathed. Scratches down the side of my face
stung. There was a limit to  how  far I could push him and
he was teetering on that line.  "Kelly,"  I croaked,
deflated.
     "Was that your name?"
     "Yes."
     "That  is better.  Ka. . . K'hy," he did an acceptable
job  of  wrapping  his  long jaws around the name.  "Do not
be such a fool. You  will  find  things a lot more
comfortable if you co-operate with us.  Do  you
understand?"
     "Yes."
     "Very good." He said,  then checked my bonds. He
huffed with  satisfaction, and before I could say anything,
he grabbed my jaws  and  rammed  the gag back in,  "Since
you do not  seem  to  enjoy  talking, you can stay quiet."
     "Sir," the female guard ventured from across the room
as  he  turned  to leave,  "is that safe?  He has no fur -
he looks cold."
     I  made  muffled  noises and frantically  tried  to
nod  my  agreement.
     He  stopped  and looked at me again.  "I think it will
survive. . . You  can  stay as you are.  No games next
time,  a?"  He  grinned, then with a final word to the
guards, he was gone.
     I  turned my incoherent appeal on the guard,  who
looked  at  me,  then settled her cloak closer about her
shoulders and leaned  back in her chair. Desperate now, I
began to struggle.
     The ropes didn't give at all. My efforts warmed me for
a while, but in no time they left me exhausted and with
wrists burning and slippery. I moaned into my gag and
collapsed into a shivering heap.
     Time passing.
     A cold aching throughout my body,  my limbs leaden and
numb.  The  shivering had died to spasmodic twitches and
then even  they  stopped.  Totally  spent I just closed my
eyes as a vague  warmth  began seeping through me.
 
******
 
     ". . . a blanket. Hurry!"
     Hands grabbed me.  If there were claws I couldn't feel
them, but they lifted me and a biting wind wound  its way
around and through me.  When I tried to open my eyes, all
I could see was swirling whiteness.  It wasn't worth it: I
closed them again and a door slammed then there Sathe
voices  all around, questioning.
     "What happened?"
     ". . . know! It is frozen!"
     ". . . it alive?"
     "Over here. . . by the fire."
     They dropped me.  Soft surface, hands grabbing me warm
around  me. There was a tingling in my limbs like pins and
needles that  grew  more and more intense,  like aching
like real needles,  then like  fire  under  my skin,  then
something beyond  burning.  I  screamed.  I  screamed until
my throat was raw, struggling and thrashing like a  beached
fish  with the ropes biting into me and  adding  to  the
pain. Shouts, growls in my ear, fur and armour against me
as they  pinned me. And the pain grew.
     The  pain  changed,   going  beyond  pain,   becoming
other  sensations.  I moaned,  unable to move,  suffering
until the flow  ebbed. They released me. I just lay there,
sobbing for breath.
     Furry arms propped me up,  something soft was thrown
around  my  shoulders and warmth was forced between my
chapped  lips.  I  could smell food; some kind of hot broth
against my lips. I swallowed eagerly and choked as it went
down the wrong way. When I recovered, I was allowed another
sip, then another. I  could  feel  the heat tracing a  warm
trail  through  my  gullet, warming from the inside.
     More pain lanced through my head as I opened an eye.
Sparks  jumped and swirled in the open fireplace before me.
All around, glimpses of polished wood,  heavy rafters,  the
glitter of  brass  and Sathe eyes.
      And there was someone touching me,  helping me sit
up.  The  bowl  was raised to my lips and again I drank.
My gaze  followed  the  furry hand holding the steaming
bowl,  travelled up the  arm  until I was nose to muzzle
with the female guard from out in  the  barn.  Her eyes -
the same emerald green -  locked with mine  for  all of two
seconds, then she pushed me away.
     Unable  to support myself I fell back into the soft
embrace  of the furs. The room swam and I moaned, clutching
at the furs to  stop myself falling onto the ceiling.
     A Sathe leaning over me,  staring into my face: ". . .
you hear  me?"
     There were other voices in the  background:
inconsequential  static.
     I rolled my head away and the noises faded as I  sank
into  simple, untainted sleep;  the  only drug used this
time being exhaustion.
 
******
 
     I  hunkered  down in the cold corner beside  the
fireplace,  huddled  against  the fire-warmed stones of the
chimney for the megre warmth they provided.  I  was  still
cold:  they  hadn't given me clothing or even  a  blanket.
Covered in goosebumps,  my privates retracted up around my
lungs.  I  was hungry.  Miserably I made myself as small as
possible  and  stared at my chains.
     While  I'd  slept  they'd replaced  the  hemp  ropes
with  manacles.  The fetters upon my feet were linked with
heavy  chain  with just enough give for me to hobble. On my
wrists the manacles  were joined by a solid iron bar just
long enough that I  couldn't  touch my fingertips together.
     The chain rattled as I picked it up, weighing the
links. A guard looked up at the sound. "Drop it," he
hissed,  hand  going  for his sword. Others looked around.
     I dropped it.
     Placated,  but still wary,  the guard settled back
into  his  chair. I heaved a shuddering sigh and stared at
my irons.
     It's  a  demoralising thing to have  your  every
movement  restricted by cold metal.  If I wanted to move
one hand, I had to  move the other, yet I couldn't bring
them together. If I couldn't  so much as touch two
fingertips together, then how the hell was I  supposed  to
do something like picking the locks?  crude as  they  were.
     Damnation!  It  was  going to be hard enough to  eat!
     I glumly turned to survey my prison again. Perhaps
there was  something I'd missed.
     A single room combining kitchen and living area.  The
walls  were  rough  wooden logs,   cracks  caulked  with
clay.  Black  rafters  supporting  a thatch roof;  solid,
utilitarian wooden  furniture  with  that  interior glow of
well-used wood were  scattered  about  the room,  the most
elaborate a pair of chairs before  the  fire.  Crockery,  a
few metal pots,  and strings of food: ears of  corn, and
various  spices sat on shelves or hung from  the  heavy
rafters, slung lower than they would be in a human house.
     Two doorways in opposite walls,  one sealed  by a door
of half-logs,  the other by a heavy tattered curtain. Wind
howled  around the wooden door, rattling it in its frame.
     Yeah. The room wasn't much of a cell, but there were
bars.
     Gulf Warriors.
     In the dim light of a lantern and the fireplace they
lounged around, looking as bored as waiting soldiers
everywhere. Some slept, using their armour as pillows. Some
played  games  of  chance. Every so often a trooper would
don armour and  cloak to go and relieve a guard on duty
outside.
     Sathe returned with their fur coated in ice and  snow.
The  hearth  was  littered with drying cloth,  armour,  and
a  single  soldier  who'd  assured  himself that I wasn't
a threat before stripping and falling asleep.
     The air  was heavy with the smells of cloth  and  wet
fur.
     Where were they taking me?
     The Gulf Realm was a pretty safe bet.
     And what would happen when they got me there?
     That one I had no answer for.  But someone had gone to
a lot  of trouble to see that I dropped by and someone
obviously  didn't  give  a flying fuck about my comfort.
Whoever it was  definitely  wanted  to  ask  a few
questions as  well,  and  I  guessed  they  wouldn't want
to talk about the weather.
     Again I shivered.
     Time passed slowly in the gloom. With the windows
shuttered,  not  a whisker of light penetrating the storm
outside,  I  didn't  know what the hour was.  Hell, I
didn't even know if it was night  or day!
     Later,  a  drab-brown  female with nervous eyes and
ears prepared  a  meal.  Civilian,  had to be.  I watched
her working at a pot over  the fire,  adding herbs and meat
and it was obvious that she  was  no part of the Gulf
retinue. Who then? One of the original residents of the
building I guessed. A farmer?
     After  a time the tangy aroma of stew prevailed  above
even  the  Sathes' miasma,  setting leathery nostrils to
twitching.  A  pre-adolescent male cub (the farmers' son?)
scampered around  the  room ladling food into the soldiers'
bowls,  dodging half-hearted  cuffs  from  claws.  Saliva
flooded my mouth as  I  watched  the  troopers  begin  to
eat and the cramps in  my  stomach  made  me  realise  how
hungry I was.  How long had it been since I'd had  a
decent meal?
     Damnation! I was starving!
     "Hey!  "  I called. A guard looked up from his meal,
his head  bobbing  and  throat  pulsing  as  he  swallowed
his   mouthful.  "Please," I glanced hungrily at his bowl.
"I need food."
     There was silence. Heads turning to stare at me.
     "Talking  now," said another voice.  The Sathe officer
rose  from his seat in the shadows across the room and
approached me. I  pressed  further  back  into  the corner
as  he  stood  over  me.  "Hungry?"
     "No, I am just making conversation," I growled,
mustering all the courage left in me. "Goddamn, You  are
killing me. I am starving and freezing."
     His  ears  set back and his muzzle rumpled up  like  a
rug. "Suddenly you seem to have become very verbose.
Perhaps I should  leave you as you are and see what else
you may say."
     "Dead people say very little."
     "People!" He hissed in amusement. "You do presume a
lot upon  yourself!" Nevertheless he snapped an order at a
trooper and  the  Sathe  filled  a bowl from the communal
pot.  Eagerly I took  the  carved  wooden  bowl  in  both
hands,  almost  drooling, then asked, "Think  you  could
take these things off so I  can  eat?"
     The Sathe officer bared his teeth.
     "Thought not," I sighed. I was forced to put the bowl
on the  ground  and kneel before it,  carrying  the
greasy,  undercooked  lumps of meat to my mouth with both
hands chained together.
     They had a good laugh.
 
******
 
     He sat there in his chair before the fire,  just
staring  at  me.  For half an hour,  just staring at me,
until I couldn't meet  his eyes and curled up, hiding my
head.
     "K'hy."
     I slowly looked up at him.
     The Sathe commander gestured at the impressive
bearskin  rug  lying in front of  the hearth. "Come here."
     I hesitated in my niche by the fire,  then,  as guards
began  to move towards me,  awkwardly shuffled out with
chains rattling to kneel on the rug. He flickered his ears
at my sullen glare.
     "Sit," he invited cordially.
     I sat.
     "Huh!"  he huffed and cocked his head,  chin propped
with  a  fist,  elbow resting on the arm of the chair.
"You really are  a  delicate creature, aren't you? Not as
dangerous as you look. Such  a thin hide. . . "
     "What  do  you want?" I demanded wearily.  I was
tired  and cold.
     "I want to talk. Scent the wind and understand, K'hy.
We are  your friends."
     "Friends!" God,  that was so pathetic I found the
energy  to  laugh.  "Friends!  You have drugged me.
Kidnapped,  frozen,  and  starved me! I would be safer with
my enemies!"
     He  sat  there and regarded me for a time.  Then gave
me  a  wide, glistening grin: "You really are not as stupid
as you look."
     Damnation! Keep your mouth shut, Davies!
     "Now, K'hy, I would like to know a little about you."
     "I need clothing. Please."
     "Perhaps,"  he  said pleasantly.  "That will depend
on  how  cooperative you are."
     "No answers, no clothes."
     "Exactly." The chair creaked as he settled back. "What
are you?"
     What would it hurt? "Human."
     "What?"
     "Human," I repeated. "That is what I am: Human."
     "H'man," he mused. "Where are you from?"
     "New York."
     His ears laid back slowly and his eyes slitted.  "Are
you,"  he hissed, "playing games again? These words mean
nothing!"
     "What  did you expect?" I snapped.  "Sathe do not
have  the  words  for what I am or where I am from.  I can
only tell you  in  the words of my kind."
     "How can you have any other kind of words?" he
sneered.  "If  a hand is not a hand,  then what is it?" He
emphasized by leaning  forward to wave his hand in front of
my face,  making sure I  saw  the claws.
     I  flinched back:  "A hand is a hand whether you call
it  by  that name or something else.  My people use
different sounds, but  they mean the same things. I still
do not know all your words."
     He leaned back,  mulling that over.  "You have had to
learn  our speech, like a newborn cub."
     "Yes."
     He  used  a clawtip to scratch at  his  muzzle,  a
rumbling  sounding in his throat. Finally he said, "Very
well. This Hew-ork,  where is it?"
     "I do not know."
     "Then  how  did  you  come to the  Eastern  Realm?"
He  was  sounding impatient again.
     "I had no choice in the matter.  I am a. . . a. . . "
Nervously  I  fumbled  for  a  phrase  I  didn't  have.  "I
do  not  know  the  words. . . survivor of an accident."
     "A  [castaway],"  he  prodded.  "You are  perhaps
from  the  continent to the south?"
     "Perhaps,"  I nodded vaguely,  trying to blur that
distinct  line. Don't press it! "I just do not know!"
     "Then  why did you go to the Eastern Realm for
assistance!"  he demanded.
     "I  did not choose!  I did not know where I was,  I
did  not  understand  Sathe.  I was looking for my own
kind,  but  I  found  yours."
     "You  found the Shirai female!" he  corrected
sharply.  His  mane began to bristle and he reached up to
pat it  smooth.  "Why did you interfere? It was not your
concern!"
     "I was defending myself," I said. "It was not
planned."
     "If it was not planned,  then why do you stay with
her?  Why  do you aid them? give them weapons?
     "Why do you feel you have to help them so much?"
     I didn't answer.
     The  blow that caught me around the ears knocked me
to  the  floor.  Dazed,  I looked up at the officer who
calmly knelt above  me:  "Come now,  if you expect me to
answer your  questions,  you  must answer mine. That is
only fair, is it not?"
     I  clenched  my  fists helplessly and struggled back
to a  sitting position, thinking unprintable thoughts.
"You forced me  to choose sides!" I snarled.  "You dragged
me into your war,  and  while they have helped me,  your
people have invaded their  land,  killing their people, and
trying to kill me.  You have seen  the scars on my chest?
Did you think they were natural?  They are a gift from one
of your own. Perhaps you knew him;  a shit called Tarsha."
     The  Sathe commander looked at my clenched  fists.
"Yes,  I  knew him,  and I can profess no love for his
techniques.  I  also  saw  his remains after the carrion
birds had finished  with  him;  his corpse and the remains
of his patrol.  I do not know how  you  killed them all,
but I am not taking chances with you.
     "Whatever  you are,  you have made some people
nervous  and  they  do not like that.  My orders are to
return with you  alive.  Alive, they made that quite clear;
as long as you are alive, they  do not care if you are
missing fingers, testicles, or toes.
     "Now,  I have heard tell of interesting new devices
that are  appearing in Mainport:  New tools. . . and new
weapons also. Did you  perchance have anything to do with
these? Yes?"
     "Perhaps," I said.
     He cuffed me around the ears again.
     I looked up at him through watering eyes.
     "Yes?" he asked mildly.
     "Yes," I growled.
     "Good. Now, do you give them this knowledge from the
goodness of you being, or is there payment involved?"
     "I try to pay my way," I said.
     "Saaaa!" His ears twitched.  "Is that all?  Perhaps it
is in  return for the favours she shows you?  What is
coupling with  her  like,  ah?" The Sathe grinned and his
ears flickered when he  saw  that hit home.  "Tell me this:
Why do you think she is willing to  do that with you?  Why
would any female couple with you?  Do  you  really believe
she is ATTRACTED to you? To YOU?! Huh!"
     I didn't want to hear this.
     He  turned to the troopers behind him,  addressed a
female:  "Mer'ap! Would you ever consider coupling with. .
 with this?"
     "Perhaps in nightmares," came the cheerful reply.
     There was the water-on-shale sound of amusement hissed
from  a dozen throats.  The commander turned his attentions
back to me.  "The Shirai could never feel for you," he
grinned.  "Anymore than  I could feel for my llama."
     "I would not put it past you," I growled.
     He  flashed  teeth.  "Insults now?  That is not
really  the  subject. You realise how you have been
manipulated?"
     "Shut your face!" I snarled.
     "Why? Are you afraid to hear the truth?"
     "What would you know of truth!"
     "Use your mind, if you are capable of it. You are
ugly. What  could she possibly see in you but a means to an
end? You are just  a  stone  she is stepping on to cross a
stream and  when  she  is  finished with you she will leave
you behind."
     I shook my head,  trying not to listen.  Inside a
seditious  voice was murmuring, It could be true!
     "She is simply using you," the Sathe's voice went  on.
"And  you are such a fool as to believe she has affections
for  you!  A  fool!"
     "I must be, to be snatched by assholes like you."
     His eyes flickered.  I grinned and he struck me again.
Even  after  the  dizziness  settled there  was  a
stinging  pain  in my ear and wetness on my shoulder.
Blood dripped to  the rug. The bastard had had his claws
out that time. I swallowed  and glared at him.
     "Take care," he growled. "You might hurt yourself."
     He wasn't funny. I didn't reply.
     Then he leaned forward and held his hand up for me to
see; flecks of blood  stippled  his fingertips.  "Some
advice:  mind your  mouth.  Some  people  are not as
patient as I am. . . and your Shirai is not  here  to watch
over you and lick you clean."
     I reached up to touch my ear. It stung. "She will find
you."
     Somehow, as a threat, it fell kind of flat.
     "I doubt it," he grinned.  "We have put some thought
into this.  You will disappear like you had never been. The
Shirai. . . well, we  have you,  her sire is dying and as
for her:  poison, a crossbow,  some  kind  of accident. . .
once you are  safely  tucked  away,  of  course."
     That. . . My  hands  stopped trembling as I  met  his
eyes.  I  simply said, "I am going to kill you."
     He spat and raised his hand to hit me again.
     There were guards around us, and I think he may have
been half expecting it, but they still weren't fast enough.
I hit him hard. He swung wildly, claws extending, striking
my shoulder when I cannoned into him, taking him over
backward, me landing on top of him.
     He managed to roll over,  to clamber to his knees.  I
swung  and clubbed him on the side of the jaw with the
manacles, sending  him tumbling.  Then I was looping my
arms around his neck, trying  to  use the bar between the
manacles as a garrotte.  He  squalled  and  ducked his
chin.  Instead of crossing his  neck the metal slipped into
his mouth, like a horse's bit.  His claws scrabbled at my
arms with  growing desperation as I hauled back,  cutting
the skin,  drawing blood,  scraping  against the fetters
that dug into my wrists.
     Perhaps  - given time -  I could've broken his neck.
But  I  didn't have time.  It was less than seconds before
the guards got  there and piled on.
     I hit the floorboards hard, ending up in a tumbled
heap back  in a corner by the fireplace. Claw cuts burned
across my body. My right shoulder howled pain, cutting
through the confusion when I  tried to move.  I couldn't.
My hands and legs were pinned. Sharp points dug at my
throat, hot breath and spittle against my skin. I froze,
gasping, just moving my eyes. The Sathe with my throat in
his jaws growled and twisted his head to glare up at me.
Teeth and  tongue rasped against my skin. I almost shit
myself.
     "Alive!" another voice screamed. "We need it alive!"
      Reluctantly,  the jaws loosened and the Sathe snarled
into my face. There were other  troopers holding - sitting
on -  my arms and legs. Over there was  the  Sathe
officer:  hanging half-supported between two  of  his
captains,  displaying  curved tongue and an impressive
array  of  dentures as he hacked and coughed,  blood-tinted
spittle  running  from  the corners of his mouth.  The
troopers carried him  bodily  from the room, through the
curtain.
     More guards approached, heavy chains draped over their
arms.
     Ah, shit!
 
******
 
     Now  a  short  chain led from my ankle fetters  to  an
iron  staple  hammered into the floor.  Also my wrists and
ankles  were  connected by a heavy chain.  I was completely
hobbled,  any hopes  of escaping retreating further across
the horizon.
     My fault!
     Damnation,  I should have just sat and let it wash
past.  He  was just trying to goad me,  to see how far he
could push  me.  I  should  have sat there and taken it,
let them think me  helpless  and  subdued,  bide my time
until an opportunity came to  make  a  break for it. Now my
stupidity had landed me with more chains and bruises.
Their punishment had been none too gentle;  working me over
good,  but taking care not to cause any damage that would
be  permanent.  Then I was dumped back into my corner where
I could use the night  to nurse my aches.
     Now the morning meal was being prepared,  the cub once
again  passed  among the waking soldiery passing out bowls
of food  with  deferential  ducks of his head.  His mother
worked by  the  fire,  stirring a pot,  occasionally adding
water. She warily watched me  as  I  struggled to sit up,
propping my back against  the  rough  wall.  My  shoulder
was swelling up and moved only  with  aching  protest.
     "You want food?" a soft,  hesitant voice ventured:
childish  tones.  The cub sidled a little closer,  bowl and
spoon in  hand.  Over his shoulder his mother was watching
with concern foremost  in her expression.
     "Thank  you,"  I grated hoarsely,  taking the bowl
that  he  proffered at arms length.  My own arms were
chained down at waist  height;  I had to double over to get
my mouth down to the bowl. I  fumbled  awkwardly  with the
spoon before it twisted  out  of  my  fingers. I stared at
the bowl in growing frustration.
     "Here," the cub offered, leaning forward and taking
the bowl  from my hands,  holding it while I used the
spoon.  It was  long,  narrow, and deep - shaped for Sathe
mouths' - but it worked. I shoveled mouthfuls as fast as I
could. . .
     "Saaaaa!  Boy!"  from behind the cub there came a cry
and  a  clatter of wooden utensils being hastily cast
aside.  The  cub  yelped,  dropped  the bowl with what
little stew was left in  it,   and  instinctively dashed to
his mother's side as several  guards  bore down upon us.
They shoved the female aside as she tried to  protect her
child and lunged for the kid.  He dodged their grasp  and
tried to duck around them,  but they had him cornered. As a
guard  moved  in I flicked the chain securing my ankle to
the  staple,  hooking it about the Sathe's feet and
pulling. The guard squalled  and  hit  the floor in a
clatter of toughened leather  and  metal  buckles.  Taking
advantage of the opening,  the cub was over  the  body,
gone.
     The trooper snarled, shook the chain away from his
leg, then  kicked out at me,  his toe claws catching me
just above the knee,  ripping up my leg.  The tingling
burning of the pain came almost as quickly as the blood,
rivulets merging and pooling.  I gasped and looked up to
see the Sathe raising his hand for another blow.
     "HOLD!" Another Sathe snarled and a hand grabbed the
trooper  and  shoved  him out of the way.  The Gulf officer
was  standing  above me with his muzzle drawn back in a
white snarl. Beneath his  fur his face was the worse for
wear:  one side swollen while  the  corners  of  his mouth
were raw and red with patches  of  clotted  blood.  Breath
hissed through flared nostrils and his eyes  were  furious
black  pools,  ears laid back flat  against  his  skull.
"You,"  his  words were scarcely  understandable,  they
were  so  distorted by his fury, "are going to learn!"
     I shrank back,  but there were enough of them to drag
me out  and  pin me down by kneeling on my arms and  legs.
Casually  the  officer  strolled  across  to the  fire  and
squatted  there.  I  couldn't see what he was doing,  but
when he turned back to me he  was holding a smoking poker,
the tip glowing red.
     "Hey. . . "  I  tried to shrink away,  but they  just
held  me  tighter. "No. No, please, do not. . . "
     He didn't speak, just waved it slowly in front of my
eyes. I  could  smell  hot metal and burnt pine.  I could
feel  the  heat,  going light headed with sudden fear and
he just stood there  with  his eyes locked on mine,
pointing the poker down at me, waving it  around my face.
Slowly he moved it down and I could feel the heat  on my
chin, my neck, my chest.
     Then he jammed it up against my left nipple.
     A  hissing,  feeling like ice at first,  then. . . I
screamed,  uncontrollably,  thrashing and bucking and
twisting madly.  Sathe  shouted, more held me. The poker
twisted and I think I passed out  then.
     Seconds. . . He  was  crouched over me,  looking down
into  my  face, still holding the poker. I could smell
burnt meat. The pain  in both my chest and leg was dull now
and I was shivering, dimly realised I  was  in shock.  His
voice growled, then he grabbed my jaw and shook me  until
he was certain he had my attention.  "You understand  now?"
he hissed. "You try something like that again, and we will
simply  hamstring you."
     "Ness. . . "  I  croaked.  My jaw didn't want  to
work.  "Next  time. . . better job."
     His eyes widened and he glanced down at my chest.  I
had  no  urge to see what was there.  Already the pain was
returning.  My  leg  spasmed and I could feel the blood
drying there.  It'd  been  sliced down to the muscle.
     "You want to die?" He stared at me, as though not
quite believing it, then snorted. "Ah, such loyalty and
stupidity." Turning to his troops he gestured at me,
"Alright, get that cleaned  and patched." Then he gathered
up his cloak  and  pushed  out into the cold whiteness
outside. The others dragged me back to the fireplace and
dumped me there. Christ, but it hurt: almost like I was
going to pass out, but it never quite happened.
     A  trooper  approached me,  a small bag  in  her
hand.  She  crouched down near me and produced herbs, small
sealed pots, a grey-brown stuff that looked like moss,  and
strips of cloth.  I recognised her as  the  guard  I'd  had
in the barn,  the one who'd fed me.  "I  want  to  help
you," she said slowly;  enunciating.  "I have your word
you  will behave?"
     I nodded vaguely, "Yes."
     Catching  a  breath  she  inched  forward  and
chirred   to  herself.  I  didn't  move as she worked on
the wound on  my  leg,  washed it clean,  pressed the moss
against it, then began binding  it,  wrapping coarse cloth
around my leg.  Considering where  the  gash  was located -
my upper-outer thigh -  it was  an  extremely  personal
operation.
     "Stay  still," she hissed through her teeth when I
flinched  at an errant brush of fur against sensitive
flesh.  Oh God! Don't  let me get an erection!
     But of course, even with the pain, just thinking about
it. . .
     The Gulf Troops saw it, laughter hissed:
     "Kas! I think it likes you!"
     "Careful. You could hurt yourself there!"
     "Ha, pity Mer'ap's not here! That could change her
mind!"
     The one working on my wound looked up at my face and
hissed  in amusement.  "Not so different then.  I am
surprised you are in  the mood."
     I felt the heat rising in my ears.  Her's fluttered
madly as she settled the bandages, then moved on to my
chest.
     My nipple was gone,  turned to a red and black ruin.
Not as bad as it looked.  He hadn't gone  deep,  being
careful  not to damage me too seriously.  Still,  it hurt
enough  when the female began to treat it and put the salve
on, almost as  much as when it happened.
     The  room  had gone silent,  the Gulf Sathe standing
and  watching  as  I  moaned and ground my teeth, fighting
to keep from striking out at the female ministering to me.
I don't remember when she finished, just that one moment
she  was pressing ointment against the charred skin,  the
next she was  packing up her equipment. "Finished,"  she
told me.  "You will be all right." Then she  leaned  closer
to my head. "Take my advice," she whispered soto voce. "Do
not  provoke  the commander.  He can be  most  unpleasant."
Then  louder she said, "Try not to do anything stupid that
might reopen  that. I will change it later."
      "What? That mean jogging's out?"  I panted in
english. She scratched her neck,  head cocked to one side
in puzzlement, then she snorted and gathered up  her kit.
 
******
 
    The storm was still blowing the next day.  It stopped
us from  going anywhere, but it also stopped any pursuit
there might be. A  stalemate.  I  wasn't going  anywhere
either.  Outside,  without  clothing  and in my condition,
I would freeze to death before  I  could get a mile.
     Still,  they watched me.  When I had to relieve
myself, they  sent a guard along.  There was a shuttered
window in the freezing  little  room that I would probably
have been able to squeeze  out  of,  but  with the
temperature outside hovering  around  zero,  I  wasn't
about to try.
     Now  I  had  an idea of just how many of  them  there
were:  approximately twenty,  a large number to be moving
around deep in  enemy  territory.   Capturing  lill'  ol'
me  was  their   only  directive? I found that hard to
swallow.
     I guess I should've been flattered.
     As the wind howled around outside and wormed its way
through  gaps  that you could have sworn weren't there a
minute  ago,  the  seven  Sathe sitting at the table played
a game of chance that  I  guess must be universal; dice.
Others were outside: barracked  in  the stables, on picket
duty. My wrists and ankles were beginning to chafe from the
constant  rubbing  of the iron manacles. Both my leg and
chest wounds were continuous sources  of  nagging  pain.  I
couldn't do much moving  without  gritting  my  teeth.  The
Sathe  who was guarding me sat in  a  chair  nearby,
cleaning his already-gleaming sword,  always keeping a
green  eye  on me.
     Bone  dice  rattled on the rough wooden table top
amid  the  muted  sibilants of Sathe voices and occasional
bout of  laughing  and curses when someone won.
     The  day dragged by slowly.  The evening meal was a
kind of sausage. Like a dog I was fed the table scraps.
     The manacles stayed on.
     Afterwards, the  cub was crouched by the fire cleaning
the dirty pots in a tub of melt water,  the  iron and
copper utensils clattering and rattling. As he worked he
stared at me where I sat near him on the rug before the
fire,  at  the  extreme extension of my tether and trying
to get as near  to  the heat as I could.  Several times it
looked as if he might  say  something,  only to change his
mind at the last second.  So I sat  in silence, watching
him work.
     As the evening dragged on into night the temperature
plummeted again. I huddled up into a small ball in front of
the open fire, for all the good that did. An icy draught
needled across the room, wending its way up the chimney and
leaving me shivering violently in its wake. My wounds ached
as my muscles knotted up.
     "Huh," a Sathe coughed. It was that female, the one
who'd patched me up. She knelt beside me, looking me over.
"What is the matter with you? Huh? Your leg?" She touched a
hand to my leg and swore, "Mother's milk! You are still
cold?" She stared then waved a shrug and left me again,
going through the curtain to the back of the house. A few
minutes later the commander himself appeared with a bundle
tucked under one arm. Guards shifted and stirred themselves
when he snapped orders, several baring their teeth and
approaching me, their clawed feet clicking against  wooden
floorboards. Instinctively I tried to move back, away from
them. They leapt forward and I yelped in pain when claws
sank in. One of them grabbed me by the  hair; dragging  me
to  my knees,  forcing my head back and  laying  bared
claws  alongside my throat.  My chest roared pain.  I began
to raise  my  hands; the claws pressed harder. I froze
motionless.
     The Gulf commander stepped around in front of me,
showing me the bundle.  "You," he said slowly and clearly,
"are going to get  your  clothing.  Your  chains  will be
removed and  you  will  do  exactly as I say. Anything else
and you will be hamstrung. Cause trouble and we kill you.
Your choice."
     As simply as that.  From the corners of my eyes I
could  see  swords glinting.
     "Understand?" the Sathe asked.
     "Yes," I croaked.
     I was hauled to my feet, the claws still at my throat
whilst  keys rattled in locks. The weights upon my wrists
and ankles were  lifted away with a clashing of heavy iron
links.
     The claws at my neck tightened still more,  breathing
became  difficult, my leg and chest ached.
     "Now, you will take the clothes and put them on. . .
slowly and carefully. Understand?"
     "Y. . . yes." I could hardly speak.
     The  claws released me and I gasped air,  starting to
reach  for  my  throat.  A sword tip tickled the skin of my
back  and  I  stopped moving, stopped breathing.
     "Good," the Commander grinned, making sure I could see
all his teeth. "Now these."
     I carefully took the clothes from him. Rough-spun
brown breeches and ragged cloak; tight for me, my leg hurt,
my nipple burned as fabric brushed it, but they were warm
and that was all I cared about. I wrapped the cloak around
my shoulders and looked at the officer. Standing, I was
almost a full head taller than he. Something flickered in
his eyes, ears went back and nostrils flared. I knew fear
when I saw it.
     And that  look  vanished under anger and he snapped an
order and the chains were brought forward again. I
retreated a single small step and suddenly the claws were
at my neck again, a low growling in my ear. I went rigid,
forced to submit to the chill iron of the restraints again.
     The Gulf Commander personally examined the  manacles.
"Keep  your  hands in sight all the time," he warned me.
"Tomorrow the storm should have abated enough for us to
leave. You are going to need the clothing.  If the guards
have cause to be suspicious  of  you, if you cause trouble,
you will be punished. We do not want to kill you, but you
will stay quiet even if we have to fill your skull with
drugs."
     He  signalled for the soldier to release me and I
sagged  to  the floor.  They didn't try and stop me when I
raised my hands to  rub  my sore neck;  red smears on my
fingertips when I looked  at  them.
     "Fragile," the commander hissed.
     "Fuck you!" I hissed right back.
     He spread his hands in a Sathe shrug and then turned
his back  on me.
     End of conversation.
     The soldiers who had clustered around drifted back to
their  games  of  chance and story telling,  leaving me
huddled there, pulling the cloak tight around myself.
There was little talking among them, the  scrape of chair
legs, the clatter of a keyring. . .
     That got my attention. There on the table, the
keyring, just  eight, ten metres. . .
     Damnation!  I slumped again.  They might as well be
back  in  Mainport.  Here am I,  unarmed,  chained to the
floor,  in a room  full of hostiles. I was just going to
get up, waltz over and say,  "'scuse me, just borrowing
these. Alright?"
     Right.
     Face it, Kelly. Your future don't look too bright.
     More  footsteps;  a half-hearted kick at my ribs to
get  my  attention  as  the female guard who'd patched me
up crouched  beside me:  "Turn around." I complied.  "Hold
out your arms," she  ordered.
     "Do  you  enjoy this as much as I do?" I  muttered  as
that  female double-checked my bonds with a critical eye.
     She  gave  the  chains a tug,  making sure  the  links
were  secure.  As if I had a chance of breaking them.  "I
am only doing  my job. . . can you move your fingers?"
     "Yeah, right, sure. . . "  I  muttered in English as
I  wriggled  my  digits. Just doing her job. I'd heard that
one before.
     Her claws caught my shoulder.  "Those noises, are they
words?"
     "What do you think?"
     She growled. "I thnk you do not know when to keep your
mouth shut. What did  you  say?"
     "It was not important," I muttered. She squeezed my
shoulder  once - hard.
     Behave yourself. . .
     But the hands stayed on my shoulder even when the
claws  had  retracted.  Her  eyes narrowed and she cocked
her head, scrutinising my face.  She had a curious ring  of
white  fur  that  poked out from under the fringe  of  her
mane,  encircling her left ear and eye. When she moved her
hand upwards,  toward my face, I flinched away. She waited,
then gently - almost  tenderly  -  touched her fingers to
my overgrown hair.  She  stroked once, twice, then dropped
her hand again.
     "What. . . "  I began and automatically tried to lift
my  hands  to  my  head only to be stopped when they
reached  the  limit  of  their chain. "Why did you do
that?"
     She  shrugged  "I wanted to see what it  felt  like.
Softer  than it looks."
     I wasn't sure when I'd started trembling, but then I
was aware my chains were rattling.  Suddenly I had  to
know. . . "What is going to happen to me?" I blurted.
     That startled her.  She stared at me,  her nostrils
flaring,  then  she  shook her head.  "You are to be  taken
to  Riverport.  Beyond that, I cannot be sure. I have heard
rumours. . . " She broke  off  and looked around quickly.
"There are whisperings that  you  can sway the balance of
the war, ensuring victory for whoever owns  you."
     "Dammit,  all  I  want is to return to my  home!  How
am  I  supposed  to sway the balance of the war if I cannot
even  remove  these?!" the manacles clattered as I shook
them.
     She looked at the irons,  then met my eyes for the
briefest  moment.  "Listen,"  she lowered her voice to a
whisper.  "I  will  have nothing to do with helping you
escape, but if you so choose,  I  can  arrange  a death
that is a lot quicker."  Her  hand  touched the silver
inlaid wood of her scabbard as she spoke.  "It  could  be
far preferable to what will probably happen to  you  in
Riverport."
     I  didn't  say anything.  She suddenly looked around
as  if  embarrassed   and flowed to her feet in one smooth
move.  "Sleep  now, all right?"
     I nodded mutely,  not caring if she understood or
not,  and  curled  up,  my  cheek  against the rug.  Was
she  trying  to  be  friendly? That offer she had made. . .
Was it going to be that bad?
     I shuddered at the cold chill that ran down my spine.
     The  shadows  on the rough wood walls danced  and
flickered  into  unearthly shapes.  Nooks and corners had
their  own  little  pools of darkness. Sathe moved around
the room without trouble in  the dimness, cat's eyes acting
like little green mirrors when the  firelight caught them.
     There was a rattle of metal on metal from the corner
by the fireplace. I looked up. The cub gave me a startled
look, then gathered up his pots and pans from where he had
been taking entirely too long cleaning up.
 
End Human Memoirs Part 2 Section C