Warlord of Kor Part 10

"Tebron broke the contact--that was in the orders too. The priesthood, which had been the connecting link with the Outsiders through the machine, was disbanded. When Tebron died he didn't appoint a successor; the machine hasn't been used since."

Manning thought about that, still frowning. "Where is the machine?"

"I don't know. If it hasn't been kept in repair it might not even be usable any more, wherever it is."

"I'll tell you something, Lee," said Manning. "There's still too much that we don't know--and too much that the Hirlaji _do_ know, now.

Whether or not your horse-buddy was picking your brains, they know we're not as strong as they thought we were. It took us eight thousand years to get here instead of five thousand. Let's just hope they don't think about that too much."

He stopped, and paced to the window again. "Look around you, Lee--out on the street, in the town. We've hardly put our feet down on this planet; we've got very little in the way of weapons with us and it will take weeks to get any more in here; there's practically no organization here yet. We could be wiped off this planet before we knew what hit us. We're sitting ducks."

He came back to stand before Rynason. "And what about the Outsiders?

They think of us strictly in terms of war, and they've been keeping themselves away from us all this time. That's obviously why they pulled out of this sector of s.p.a.ce. Up until now we'd thought they were dead.

But now we find they've been in contact with this planet ... all right, it was eight thousand years ago. But that's a lot more recent than the last evidences we've had of them, and they've obviously been watching us.

"Now, you've been in direct contact with the horses' minds; you've practically been one of them yourself, for awhile. All right, what's their reaction going to be when they realize that the Outsiders, their G.o.d, overestimated us? What will they do?"

Rynason thought about that. He tried to remember the minds he had touched during the linkage with Horng: Tebron, the ancient warrior-king, and the young Hirlaji staring at the buildings of one of the ancient cities, and the old, dying one who had decided not to plant again one year ... and Horng himself, tired and calm on the edge of the Flat, amid the ruins of a city. He remembered the others in that crumbling last home of an entire race ... slow, quiet, uncaring.

"I don't think they'll do anything. They wouldn't see any point to it."

He paused, remembering. "They lost all their purpose eight thousand years ago," he said quietly.

Manning grunted. "Somehow I lack your touching faith in them."

"And somehow," Rynason said, "I lack your burning ambition to find an enemy, a handy menace to crush. You argue too hard, Manning."

Manning raised an eyebrow. "I suppose I haven't even put a doubt in your mind about them? Not one doubt?"

Rynason turned away and didn't answer.

Manning sighed. "Maybe it's time I went out there myself and had a seance with the horses." He set down his gla.s.s of brandy, which he had been turning in his hand as he spoke. "Lee, I want you to check back here with me in two hours ... by then I should have things straightened up and ready to go."

He strode to the supply closet at one end of the room and took from it a belt and holster, from which he removed a recent-model regulation stunner. "This is as powerful a weapon as we have here so far, except for the heavy stuff. I hope we never have to use any of that--clearing it for use is a lot of red tape." He looked up and saw the cold expression on Rynason's face. "Of course, I hope we don't have to use the stunners, either," he said calmly.

Rynason turned without a word and went to the door. He stopped there for a moment and watched Manning checking over the weapon. He was thinking of the disintegrators he had seen on the steps of the Temple of Kor, and of the sh.e.l.l of a body tumbling out of the shadows.

"I'll see you at 600," he said.

SEVEN

Rynason spent the next two hours in town, moving through the windy streets and thinking about what Manning had said. He was right, in a way: this was no more than a foothold for the Earthmen, a touchdown point. It wasn't even a community yet; buildings were still going up, prices varied widely not only between landings of s.p.a.cers but also according to who did the selling. A lot of the men here were trying some mining out on the west Flat; their findings had so far been small but they brought the only real income the planet had so far yielded. The rest of the town was rising on its own weight: bars, rooming houses, laundries, and diners--establishments which thrived only because there were men here to patronize them. Several weeks before a few of the men had tried killing and eating the small animals who darted through the alleys, but too many of those men had died and the practice had been quickly abandoned. And they had noticed that when those animals foraged in the refuse heaps outside the town, they died too.

A few of the big corporations had sent out field men to look around, but it was too soon for any industry to have established itself here; all the planet offered so far was room to expand. Despite the wide expansion of the Earthmen through the stars, a planet where conditions were at all favorable for living was not to be overlooked; the continuing population explosion, despite tight regulations on the inner worlds, had kept up with the colonization of these worlds, and new room was constantly needed.

But the planetfall on Hirlaj was still new. A handful of Earthmen had come, but they had not yet brought their civilization with them. They stood precariously on the Flat, waiting for more settlers to come in and build with them. If there should be trouble before more men arrived....

At 600 Rynason walked out on the dirt-packed street to Manning's quarters. He met Marc Stoworth and Jules Lessingham coming out the door.

They looked worried.

"What's wrong?" he said.

They didn't stop as they went by. "Ask the old man," said Stoworth, going past with an uncharacteristically hurried step.

Rynason went on in through the open door. Manning was in the front room, amid several crates of stunner-units. He looked up quickly as Rynason entered and waved brusquely to him.

"Help me get this stuff unloaded, Lee."

Rynason fished for his sheath-knife and started cutting open one of the crates. "Why are you unloading the a.r.s.enal?"

"Because we may need it. Couple of the boys were just out at the horse-pasture, and they say the friendly natives have disappeared."

"Jules and Stoworth? I met them on the way in."

"They were doing some follow-up work out there ... or at least they were going to. There's not a single one of them there, not a trace of them."

Rynason frowned. "They were all there this morning."

"They're not there now!" Manning snapped. "I don't like it, not after what you've told me. We're going to look for them."

"With stunners?"

"Yes. Right now Mara is out at the field clearing several of the fliers to use in scouting for them."

Rynason stacked the boxes of weapons and power-packs on the floor where Manning indicated. There were about forty of them--blunt-barrelled guns with thick casing around the powerpacks, weighing about ten pounds each.

They looked as statically blunt as anvils, but they could stun any animal at two hundred yards; within a two-foot range, they could shake a rock wall down.

"How many men are we taking with us?" Rynason asked, eying the stacks on the floor.

Manning looked up at him briefly. "As many as we can get. I'm calling a militia; Stoworth and Lessingham went into town to round up some men."

So he was going ahead with the power-grab; Malhomme had been right. No danger had been proven yet, but that wouldn't stop Manning--nor the drifters he'd been buying in the town. Killing was an everyday thing to them.

"How many of the Hirlaji do you think we'll have to kill to make it look important to the Council?" Rynason asked after a moment, his voice deliberately inflectionless.

Manning looked up at him with a calculating eye. Rynason met his gaze directly, daring the man to take offense. He didn't.

"All right, it's a break for me," Manning shrugged. "What did you expect? There's precious little opportunity on this desert rock for leadership in any sense that you might approve of." He paused. "I don't know if it will be necessary to kill any of them. Take it easy and we'll see."

Rynason's eyes were cold. "All right, we'll see. But just remember, I'll be watching just as closely as you. If you start any violence that isn't necessary...."

"What will you do, Lee?" said Manning. "Report me to the Council?

They'll listen to me before they'd pay attention to complaints from a n.o.body who's been drifting around the outworlds for most of his life.

That's all you are, you know, Lee--a drifter, a b.u.m, like the rest of them. That's what everybody out here on the Edge is ... unless he does something about it.

"I hold the reins right now. If I decide to do something that you don't like, you won't be able to stop me ... neither you, nor your female friend."