Acorna's Rebels Part 27

Acorna nodded and they ascended in the flitter, accelerating until they saw the dust from the various riders and the wagons. Flying past the riders close enough above them to be seen and yet not so close as to frighten the beasts, Acorna tipped the wings of the flitter. One rider broke off from the others and rode hard to the south, waving at her to follow. Acorna allowed the man to get ahead of them, then swooped after him.

Soon they were no longer in the desert, but were sailing over broad foothills and plains, crisscrossed with rivers and streams - the landscape of the steppes she recalled from Nadhari's mental images. They saw the Temple long before their guide reached it. It sat in the middle of a green river delta. The cat whose shape this temple bore was long and hunkered down to drink-its tongue was a drawbridge, now lowered, and its tail a wall to a moat. Guardian priests stood behind its ears.

Surrounding it on the green were herds of beasts, and from the air a mile away Acorna could smell their sickness.

Acorna said, "We should stop and help them."

RK replied, (Cats first. Those are just ordinary food animals. What good are they compared with the lives of Grimla's and the guys' fellow holy cats?)

(You have no objection to eating those animals you disdain so much,) Acorna told the cat rather sharply.

To her surprise, RK actually considered for a moment, then said, (Hmmm, right you are. Still, cats first, then the food beasts.)

(If there are any cats still living at this Temple,) Acorna said, her voice tight at the grim thought that they might have died while she dallied in Hissim.

(Oh, most of them are still alive. I can hear that. But they are very sick and already have lost two of their number,) RK told her.

And suddenly Acorna heard them too. Thin, plaintive yowls, sick strangled coughing, and the kittens-the poor little things were as quiet and limp as damp rags. Becker said, "You and the kid and the cats go do your thing, Princess. I'll guard the flitter and lift off in case anyone tries to hijack it."

Acorna said, "I don't suppose anyone here would know how to fly it anyway."

"You never know," Becker replied.

Sixteen.

Miw-Sher scrambled out of the flitter before Acorna, and spoke to the crowd in her own language. Acorna was too overwhelmed with the mental pleas of the sick cats to pay much attention to her friend's words. In the courtyard, people began to gather. Most of them carried cats in their arms, all of whom were limp and listless looking. Many, many more cats had survived here than in Hissim. Miw-Sher spoke to the people quickly and urgently while the Hissim Temple cats leaped down after her and prowled among the legs of the gathering crowd.

When Acorna climbed from the flitter, a hush fell over the a.s.sembly. For a moment she stared down at the tops of bald heads, dark heads, red heads, all clothed in robes of rough scarlet cloth. In the evening sky the scarlet suns drooped one after the other, and through the mist rising from the river's surface, a pair of moons began to rise, each seeming to have a slice cut from its right side.

Acorna stepped out among them and looked at Miw-Sher. "What did you tell them?"

"I said that you are the one prophesied to save us, and that you could heal our sacred ones. I told them the healthy Temple cats who came with us were proof of your powers, but they didn't need proof. Many recognized you."

"Recognized me? But I've never been here before," Acorna said. She didn't wait for them to explain, however, but reached for the first sick cat. She clucked to RK to jump up on her shoulder. (You're my cover. Look useful. Like some kind of cat miracle worker. I don't want them to know how I do this.)

(Happy to oblige, but I don't think they care.)

Acorna saw that he was right. The first person she approached knelt and held up the patient, a black-and-white-spotted cat with a black nose and pads. The cat was too limp to raise his head, but RK perched on Acorna's shoulder and licked the sick cat's ear. Acorna carefully knelt, so as not to dislodge RK, and laid her face in the stricken cat's damp fur so that her horn ran along his spine.

And the cat, still held in the upraised hands of its human friend, bloomed out of his withered state, stretched all four paws out into the air, gave RK a baleful look for taking such liberties, rolled off the hands that had held it, and strolled away, presumably in the direction of a food dish. Which reminded Acorna of how the cat had probably come to be ill. "Miw-Sher, would you catch that last patient, please? Thank you. Captain Becker, if you would be so kind as to bring some of our cat food cargo down here to share among the convalescents, we can tell these folks about the tainted food after we revive their guardians."

By that time she had moved along to the next cat. But before she healed it, she called again to Miw-Sher, who was poking the black nose of the black-and-white cat into the food bag Becker lowered to the ground. "Miw-Sher, would you please sort the patients for me? Kittens and mothers should be treated first, in order of the sickest to the least affected, followed by the rest of the adults in the same order. There are so many I'm afraid we may lose some before I finish."

Miw-Sher hurried to comply, reorganizing the handlers and cats while Acorna and RK made contact with the next patient.

This ailing party was an especially large creature with tawny spots on a black coat and tufted ears. Her coat was smooth and she was still strongly muscled beneath it. Acorna thought that this one had not been ill very long. It took only the slightest touch before the big feline raised her head and gave a lick to RK's nose and Acorna's hand. Then she adroitly flipped herself out of the grip of her handler and prowled over to investigate the food bag Becker had dragged into the Temple yard.

Before tending the next patient, Acorna called, "Captain, I don't think we need to guard the food bag or the flitter here. You might check with one of the priests and see if relief packages containing food have recently arrived from Hissim. If so, reseal the package and keep it safe until Captain MacDonald can arrive to a.n.a.lyze it."

Becker gave her a small salute and hurried off.

A priestess held out a mother cat, nearly dead, and a basket of tiny feeble kittens, blind, all but bald, and smaller than most of the mice Acorna had seen on Kezdet.

As RK extended his neck to lick, there was a sudden hiss and RK sprang away. Instantly he was replaced by Grimla, now all purrs and maternal concern. Or perhaps, considering her age, grand-maternal concern. After Acorna touched each patient with her horn, Grimla groomed them. First she groomed a kitten, then licked the mother, then groomed another kitten, until all were as normal as a new mother and very small babies could be.

RK strolled unconcernedly over to the food bag, pausing to lick his fur back into place. (She only had to say she wanted to help. No need to get huffy.)

Acorna felt his surprise as Miw-Sher knelt down to pet him, scratch his ears and whiskers, and tell him, "Grimla meant you no disrespect, n.o.ble ship's cat. But she feels a strong responsibility for rearing our young and believes that it is too delicate a job to leave to the uncertain affections of a torn."

RK looked up at her and gave an aggrieved "meow" and headb.u.t.ted her leg.

Three more litters of kittens and mothers, and then a basket of kittens without a mother. "Where is she?" Acorna asked.

A youth of about fourteen with a shaved head, and bright, watery brown eyes answered in a carefully controlled voice.

"Died in delivery," Miw-Sher answered, translating the unfamiliar dialect for Acorna. "Before the others took sick. The mother was his special charge."

"But then these little ones cannot have eaten the tainted food," Acorna said.

"No, Lady. They are simply too small to do without a mother, and very hungry."

Grimla dismounted from Acorna's shoulder and meowed from the ground, looking up at Acorna, at the basket, and at the boy holding it, then meowing again.

"She wants to adopt them," Miw-Sher interpreted again. And to the boy she said, "Set down the basket. My guardian lady Grimla will feed them."

(She's too old,) RK said. (That old queen hasn't seen a decent heat in years.)

(Don't be such a sore loser,) Acorna told him. And this time she knelt to pet Grimla, touching her horn to the old cat's underside. The withered teats plumped up almost at once and Grimla, purring, accepted the orphaned kittens as Miw-Sher and the boy tenderly placed them one at a time to feed.

Many cats later, Acorna felt as though she were swimming through mud. She was so tired and so drained, she felt she could barely move.

She lowered her head to touch a particularly sick tabby and her knees buckled. Becker was at her side immediately, his arm shoring her up as she fought her way back to wakefulness. When her eyes focused again she was surprised to see that the suns were once more high in the sky, the moons long since set.

"Hey there, Princess," Becker said. "You're getting a little see-throughish in the old horn area. They still had a lot of kitties here, huh? And now they'll keep them, thanks to you."

"Just... a few more," she said.

But Miw-Sher was kneeling beside her, saying, "No, Lady. That is all. They are all well. The food bag is empty, however. Pash, Sher-Paw, and Haji are not happy. And Grimla will need to eat soon to replenish her milk."

"Then bring me the tainted food," Acorna whispered hoa.r.s.ely to Becker. Her neck ached from lowering it to touch the fur of the cats.

"You can't detoxify that," Becker whispered back. "You haven't got enough left in you. You need to eat something yourself and get some rest before you do anybody else."

They had been speaking so urgently, with their heads close together, that when one of the priests tapped Becker on the shoulder he drew back on the man before he saw that the priest was pointing to the flitter. Its com unit was sending a signal for him to receive a transmission.

Acorna reluctantly accepted his help to half carry her back up to the flitter, and when she was seated, he toggled the unit. "Captain," Mac said, "how is the flitter working out for you? Isn't it a fine one? Did you rescue our crew members?"