The Forlorn(49)

"A place. You've got to tie it to a place, dammit," Cap said, his ire rising in a perceptible tide.

Keilin shook his head helplessly. "I've told you all I can," he said. "But . . . there are four sections," he lied conservatively. He could always say it was a mistake. "It's somewhere north of here."

"Great. Why the hell couldn't you mindee types get that before we ran south?" Cap said in disgust. "You damn psi are all the same. Bloody prima donnas and then next to useless on top of it. S'kith! Come here, damn you!" Instead the Morkth-man curled himself into a ball. Cap stepped over, gripped him by the shoulder and shook him so that his teeth rattled. It was only in acts like this that one got some idea of the power in that tall, spare frame.

But it had no effect on S'kith. He stayed lost in his distress. Cap took out his knife.

"Don't!" said Keilin. He'd not been too sure if this was to be execution or just blood for the core-section contact. Seeing the look his interruption had brought him he decided to play it as the latter. "Cap . . . in his present state, give him a core section and he'll call the Morkth down on us." Cap's eyes narrowed. Finally he nodded and dropped S'kith to sprawl like a rag doll. His eyes caught Kim's horrified ones. "Come here, girl."

Once again Keilin risked life and limb. He didn't dare risk the familiarity of "Cap." "Sir! Let her put it in her mouth. Then she won't be so scared." It earned him another fulminating look, but Cap did allow her to put it into her mouth, instead of using his knife.

For the first time Keilin saw what happened instead of having it happen to him. Her face lost expression. A vague nimbus seemed to dance around her.

And then she was back. Her eyes darted to his face for a brief frightened moment, before answering Cap's query calmly. "The same as Keilin . . . with Morkth clickspeech. I think it must be the inside of a hive."

"The inside of a hive . . ." said Cap and whistled between his teeth. "I knew it had to come to this sooner or later . . . Question is: Which hive? To the north, yes, but which side of the narrow sea?" He sighed. "We'll have to try and get something more out of that jelly of a Morkth-man's brains . . . when he's stopped bloody quivering. See that he is kept warm. Try to get him to eat." Although this was directed at both of them, it was loftily ignored by Kim. She waited until Cap had stalked off into the dark and then retreated to her own gear. Keilin was left to try to spoon the thick pea soup into the vacant-eyed man's mouth. He found himself sitting with an arm around the crumpled-in shoulders for a long time.

Finally, the muscular man shook himself, and sat up. He looked at Keilin strangely and then as if tasting an unfamiliar word in half-whisper he said, "Friend?" Keilin looked doubtful for a moment, and then nodded. The man stood up without a word and went across to his sleeping furs. With relief Keilin went to his own. He was just settling down when it occurred to him that he'd better return haughty Miss Muffet's bangle to her. With it, and another small bundle in hand he crept quietly across to her bedroll.

"Go away! If you come near me again, I shall scream," she said in a fierce whisper. "Oh! It's you Keilin . . . I thought . . . I thought it was S'kith . . . again. Don't go . . . I need to talk to you."

"Don't whisper. The sound carries much better than just talking quietly," he said in a low voice. "If you want to shout at me as usual, we'd better sneak away from the camp a bit."

"Oh, you . . . yes we'd better. I always end up wanting to shout at you, no matter how we start," she said, getting up.

Soon they were sitting on a small knoll about two hundred yards from the campfire. They were out on the great sward of the southern plain, under a full moon. The night wind sent waves of silver and darkness washing across it from far horizon to far horizon.

Without intent she reached out and touched his arm. "It's so beautiful."

He nodded. "Like something out of a romance novel."

She snorted. "What do you know about novels? I'll bet you've never even seen one, and couldn't read it if you did." He was about to protest when she continued, "Look, that's not what I brought you here to talk about. Keilin . . . go very carefully with Cap. He's this close to killing you."

"What?! I mean, I know he's got a bad temper . . ." he said, earlier protests about books forgotten.

"I've been taught to read voices. I promise you, you were so close this afternoon I was nearly scared out of my wits. Cap needs to be in control. He doesn't allow others to challenge him. He didn't like your questioning him, and he likes your being right even less," she said.