"Man," snarled Egil. "I'll show you who's a man, you scapegrace little
vixen!"
He wrenched off his girdle with his free hand, at the same time bending
the girl around so he could get a fair shot at her. The creature of
prey, a Terran falcon, clung to her wrist, beating its wings and
screaming, its hooded head jerking.
* * * * *
With a motion so quick that it was hardly visible, Varra slipped the
hood and flew the creature straight for Egil's face.
He let go, flinging up his arms to ward off the talons and the tearing
beak. The wide wings beat and hammered. Egil yelled. The boy Bor got
out of range and danced up and down shrieking with delight.
Varra stood quietly. The bruises were blackening on her arm, but she
did not deign to touch them. Egil blundered against the gaming table
and sent the ivory pieces flying. Then he tripped over a cushion and
fell flat, and the hungry talons ripped his tunic to ribbons down the
back.
Varra whistled, a clear peremptory call. The creature gave a last peck
at the back of Egil's head and flopped sullenly back to its perch on
her wrist. She held it, turning toward Stark. He knew from the poise
of her that she was on the verge of launching her pet at him. But she
studied him and then shook her head.
"No," she said, and slipped the hood back on. "You would kill it."
Egil had scrambled up and gone off into the darkness, sucking a cut on
his arm. His face was black with rage. The other man looked at Varra.
"If you were pledged to me," he said, "I'd have that temper out of you!"
"Come and try it," answered Varra.
The man shrugged and sat down. "It's not my place. I keep the peace in
my own house." He glanced at the woman in white, and Stark saw that her
face, hitherto blank of any expression, had taken on a look of abject
fear.
"You do," said Varra, "and, if I were Arel, I would stab you while you
slept. But you're safe. She had no spirit to begin with."
Arel shivered and looked steadfastly at her hands. The man began to
gather up the scattered pieces. He said casually, "Egil will wring your
neck some day, Varra, and I shan't weep to see it."
All this time the old woman had eaten and watched, watched and eaten,
her eyes glittering with interest.
"A pretty brood, are they not?" she demanded of Stark. "Full of spirit,
quarrelling like young hawks in the nest. That's why I keep them around
me, so--they are such sport to watch. All except Treon there." She
indicated the crippled youth. "He does nothing. Dull and soft-mouthed,
worse than Arel. What a grandson to be cursed with! But his sister has
fire enough for two." She munched a sweet, grunting with pride.
Treon raised his head and spoke, and his voice was like music, echoing
with an eerie liveliness in that dark place.
"Dull I may be, Grandmother, and weak in body, and without hope. Yet I
shall be the last of the Lhari. Death sits waiting on the towers, and
he shall gather you all before me. I know, for the winds have told me."
He turned his suffering eyes upon Stark and smiled, a smile of such woe
and resignation that the Earthman's heart ached with it. Yet there was
a thankfulness in it too, as though some long waiting was over at last.
"You," he said softly, "Stranger with the fierce eyes. I saw you come,
out of the darkness, and where you set foot there was a bloody print.
Your arms were red to the elbows, and your breast was splashed with the
redness, and on your brow was the symbol of death. Then I knew, and the
wind whispered into my ear, 'It is so. This man shall pull the castle
down, and its stones shall crush Shuruun and set the Lost Ones free'."
He laughed, very quietly. "Look at him, all of you. For he will be your
doom!"
There was a moment's silence, and Stark, with all the superstitions of
a wild race thick within him, turned cold to the roots of his hair.
Then the old woman said disgustedly, "Have the winds warned you of
this, my idiot?"
And with astonishing force and accuracy she picked up a ripe fruit and
flung it at Treon.
"Stop your mouth with that," she told him. "I am weary to death of your
prophecies."
* * * * *
Treon looked at the crimson juice trickling slowly down the breast of
his tunic, to drip upon the carving in his lap. The half formed head
was covered with it. Treon was shaking with silent mirth.
"Well," said Varra, coming up to Stark, "what do you think of the
Lhari? The proud Lhari, who would not stoop to mingle their blood with
the cattle of the swamps. My half-witted brother, my worthless cousins,
that little monster Bor who is the last twig of the tree--do you wonder
I flew my falcon at Egil?"
She waited for an answer, her head thrown back, the silver curls
framing her face like wisps of storm-cloud. There was a swagger about
her that at once irritated and delighted Stark. A hellcat, he thought,
but a mighty fetching one, and bold as brass. Bold--and honest. Her
lips were parted, midway between anger and a smile.
He caught her to him suddenly and kissed her, holding her slim strong
body as though she were a doll. He was in no hurry to set her down.
When at last he did, he grinned and said, "Was that what you wanted?"
"Yes," answered Varra. "That was what I wanted." She spun about, her
jaw set dangerously. "Grandmother...."
She got no farther. Stark saw that the old woman was attempting to sit
upright, her face purpling with effort and the most terrible wrath he
had ever seen.
"You," she gasped at the girl. She choked on her fury and her shortness
of breath, and then Egil came soft-footed into the light, bearing in
his hand a thing made of black metal and oddly shaped, with a blunt,
thick muzzle.
"Lie back, Grandmother," he said. "I had a mind to use this on Varra--"
Even as he spoke he pressed a stud, and Stark in the act of leaping
for the sheltering darkness, crashed down and lay like a dead man.
There had been no sound, no flash, nothing, but a vast hand that smote
him suddenly into oblivion.