The Mantooth Part 7

Everything I knew is gone.' Kalus answered softly.

'Is that what the voice in the mirror was trying to tell me?'

'I thought you had forgotten.'

'I do not forget, Sylviana. And I think of things more than you know. I am not one of the lesser animals. I am only different from you.'

'I'm sorry.' Again she hung her head.

'Don't be sorry for things that are not wrong. You have your sorrows and I have mine. Do not think of it now. There is only one more thing I must ask you.'

'What is it?'

'Why did you not die with the others? And living, how have you not grown old? Is your flesh so different from mine?'

'No, Kalus. It's very much the same.' She felt weak and tearful, but also a strange determination to see it through. An unusual emotion for her: direct rebellion against despair.

'My father was a scientist, a man of learning. Somehow he knew the war was coming. Maybe I should have known it, too, but try to understand. My friends and I had lived with the threat of nuclear destruction all our lives. It just didn't seem real.....

'My father used all the money he had saved since my mother died, to build a shelter in the Canadian Rockies. And he was involved with several of his colleagues, other scientists like himself, in cryogenic research: a way of putting people into a deep sleep, like hibernation.

'Just before the missiles starting falling..... My father took me up in his plane. We listened, horrified, to radio broadcasts of the destruction of the cities, and of the spreading fallout. He told me that he wanted to put me into a suspended state, which would keep me alive until..... Until what, I couldn't imagine.'

'My mind just couldn't accept what was happening. I was terrified, and told him I didn't want to leave him. But he said it was the only way. When we landed, he said that he was sorry. He had to drug me, I guess, because the next thing I knew I was in something like a casket with my father leaning over me, crying, and telling me he loved me.'

She broke down, turned against the stone wall, and wept. Kalus looked at her, and but for the iron discipline he had learned, the alternative to which was death, would have gone to her and comforted her as best he could. As it was he felt more stirred than at any time since his father's death, and quietly vowed that he would stay with her, and protect her until the end.

Sylviana recovered somewhat, looked back at him, and seeing the confused sympathy of his eyes, concluded.

'I woke in the Mantis' cave, with no idea where I was or how I came here. I've been alone for nearly three months. But for the Voice, and later, for Akar..... I nearly lost my mind with fear and loneliness.' She suddenly realized the wolf was no longer with them, and that full night was falling. She let her thoughts collapse.

Kalus could not hold himself back any longer. 'You're not alone anymore.'

Her eyes sought out his, but they were hidden among the deepening shadows of the nook. With only his limbs clearly visible, he looked like some phantom sage of the darkness, at once frightening and rea.s.suring. 'But you must not feel it now. Feeling is for when the body is safe, and we are not. Now you should sleep..... I will guard you.'

She moved further into the cave and lay down. But though she tossed and turned for what seemed an eternity, sleep remained the distant dream of a child.

'Kalus?' No reply. She sat up and turned back toward him.

'You wouldn't hurt me, would you? Please say you'd never hurt me.'

'Of course I would not hurt you. Why do you think I stay?' He added after a time, sounding cold and irritable. 'Go to sleep and trouble me no more. I have much to think on.'

Now what had she done to upset him? Feeling more lost than ever, she swallowed hard and turned away. She lay down again, and perhaps an hour later, fell at last into exhausted slumber.

Long after the wolf had returned and lay sleeping beside her, Kalus remained wide awake, crouched at the edge of the shaft, listening. He studied the slow, deliberate breathing of the giant insect, trying to be certain. When he was as sure as he could be that the creature was still asleep, he began to descend.

He felt hollow as he went, partly from fear, and partly from the will-crushing desperation of the act now forced upon him. He was angry at having to be short with the girl, and once more felt bitterly abandoned and betrayed, though by whom he could not have said. And then came the voice that told him such an act was unnecessary---that he risked all their lives for nothing---the cruelest lie of all. No. He knew what must be done.

But always now his thoughts returned to fear; with every step the feeling grew. By the time he reached the floor of the Mantis' cave, terror had completely overtaken him. But still he went on. He HAD to have a weapon. The Mantis might banish them that very morning, and without it they were naked and helpless. And he knew that whatever prayers he might offer, to the G.o.d he did not know, no one could save him now but himself.

Later that night he returned, alive but nearly paralyzed with fear.

Unable to overcome the emotion, he went to the girl. Touching her face with the back of his trembling hand, he woke her gently. He could no longer fight back the tears as she turned to face him.

'What is it?' she asked. 'What's wrong?' He tried to tell her what he was feeling, but it was all too much. Rising to a sit beside him, Sylviana took his face in her hands and tried to understand.

Then she took his head tentatively to her shoulder, where he wept like a brutalized child. Feeling awkward, but very warm, she stroked his gnarled hair and rocked him slowly.

When morning came it found them still anxious and afraid, but infinitely closer than they had been only hours before.

Chapter 8

The Mantis appeared at the entrance of his cave about an hour after sunrise. Kalus and the wolf had waited by the opening of the smaller enclosure, and knew without being told that he was ready with an answer.

Seeing them high above, Skither raised one foreclaw and summoned them to come down. As they drew closer he stepped out slowly toward the center of the ledge. He wanted to choose the right words.

He exchanged simple greetings with the wolf, nodding pa.s.sively at Kalus.

He addressed Akar first, and after several minutes the wolf nodded his understanding and moved to wait at a far corner of the ledge, without giving any indication what the answer had been. Turning his attention to Kalus, the Mantis signaled his words slowly and carefully.

'Son of the hill-tribe, I have made my decision. I have thought long on your words, and on other things you do not know. Understand, I have good reason to mistrust your kinsmen. But Akar tells me you are not like them, and I accept his judgment.' He stopped for a moment, genuinely moved by the man-child's countenance: the troubled face, exhausted by hope and fear alike.

'I have decided to let you stay, young one. But under the following conditions. You will remain in the smaller cave, using my own only at greatest need. Further, you must be prepared to leave it upon my return, twenty days, perhaps more. You may fool my enemies for a time, but it is unwise to think you could hold them off longer. I will circle the mountain twice, giving credence to your sound-making device. Beyond that you are on your own. I will give Akar the rest of my thoughts. He stands in my place while I am gone. Heed him well, I do not place my trust in him lightly..... Do you hear my words?'

'Yes, master. I am grateful.' He wanted badly to leave, but the Mantis' knowing gaze would not release him.