II

The wind was strong when they were beyond the island. The sail bellied

out in front of them like a great crescent dish; the spoon-shaped boat,

barely skimming the surface of the water, rode high on a white wave

beneath it. Zee lay on her side, upraised upon an elbow with her hand

on the knife-blade rudder that trailed the water behind them. Beside

her, hunched with arms wrapping his upraised knees, Martt sat and

peered ahead under the sail.

The lake was dim in the starlight; its concavity rose to the horizon.

It seemed empty ahead. No boats. The wading giant had vanished; the

swimming figures were gone.

As they sailed with the wind, the night seemed windless and calm, save

that the lake boiled under them, swiftly passing. Martt was in no mood

to talk. Zee, too, was silent, engrossed with her task of guiding the

boat.

Occasionally, with a surreptitious, sidelong glance, Martt regarded her

intent little face, earnest and solemn. Long, dark lashes, tendrils of

dark hair around the slim white column of her throat; her outstretched

limbs revealed by the stirring draperies. . . . A lock of her hair flew

across his cheek. He touched it, cast it away.

"Zee?"

"Yes, Martt?"

"I was thinking--you dance very beautifully."

She turned to him, and smiled; a whimsical smile, and her eyes were

dark woodland dells of fairyland. "Father does not think so. A peddler

of movement--violent, tempestuous movement! Do you think that, Martt?"

"No," he assured her. "Of course I don't." As she turned back to her

steering, his fingers furtively caught a hem of her robe and held it.

There was a long silence. Then he said, as though there had been no

silence, "Of course I don't. I think you dance beautifully." And he

added, "It made me----" His tongue was about to say, "It made me love

you," but his beating heart smothered the words. He amended, "It made

me think that your father was very wrong to say that. And about Leela,

too."

At the mention of Leela he saw a shadow cross Zee's face. He tensed

himself; set his jaw grimly. This was no time for thoughts of love.

Leela, and his sister Frannie, were captured by giants. There was work,

danger for him and for Zee, up ahead in this starlit night. He would

need all his wits, all his resourcefulness. . . .

He remembered the one visit he had formerly made to Reaf; tried to

recall how the city lay. Tried to plan what he and Zee would do, now

when they got there.

He said, "Zee, the rivers at Reaf that plunge into the mountains--no

one has been in them very far?"

"No," she said.

"Can you walk along their banks, inside, under the mountains?"

She nodded. "In some places there are narrow ledges beside the water.

But how far--no one knows."

"And in other places--near Reaf, I mean--there are tunnels?

Passageways?"

"Yes. Back into the caves and beyond."

"I think," he said, "that back through there is the way to the giants'

huge outer world. They've come down, and through the ground behind the

mountains. Do you suppose they'll take Leela and Frannie up to their

own realm? Or keep them in Reaf?"

"I think--we do not know anything about it," she said.

He smiled grimly. "You're right, we don't. Why the giants should come

here at all I don't know. But we're going to know more about it before

we get through with them, Zee. What I'm hoping is that we might find

one of them alone. We've got to get the drugs away from them somehow.

We've got to."

Martt remembered once arguing with Brett about the giants. Brett

had thought that they used some drug--two drugs--one to shrink

proportionately each of their body cells, and the other similarly to

increase the size of the cells. Drugs of the kind had already been

sought for on Earth. Nitrogen was the basis for growth. And the new

element, Parogen, had been found to cause a shrinkage. In Mars they had

developed such drugs further--but they were still impractical for human

use.

These giants evidently had something of the kind. And it must be

radio-active--it must cause a radiation affecting vegetable or animal

matter in near proximity to the changing body. The garments of the

giants expanded and contracted with their bodies. But Brett had said

that a weapon in your hand--particularly one of mineral--would not

change size. . . . The thought was to some slight degree, at least,

comforting to Martt; the giants would be unarmed.

Zee's voice broke in on his thoughts. "Look, there are the mountains

behind Reaf."

Over the lake, ahead of them the distant horizon was a haze of

phosphorescence. But to the left a line of shore had become visible;

and now Martt saw up ahead the vague, dark outlines of the mountains.

Sharp, jagged peaks, tinged with a green-white.

Another hour. The shore to the left was nearer. Undulating land along

the lake. A ribbon of road along the water . . . Martt thought he could

see blobs moving along it. Away from Reaf, moving toward Crescent.

"The refugees from Reaf," said Zee. "The messenger said all the roads

were crowded."

Another half-hour. Ahead the mountains frowned, rising sheer from

the water. The lake was more shallow here; they began passing flat,

muddy islands, with river channels flowing between them as in a delta.

A blur there, at the foot of the mountains, was Reaf. The silver

phosphorescence of the lake was darkening; the water looked muddy,

turgid. In a narrow channel between two islands, Martt noticed a quite

visible current flowing toward Reaf. It rippled the water as it passed

over a bar which Zee skilfully avoided.

There were other islands, with water bubbling up from them, and clouds

of steam rising. Zee trailed her hand overboard.

"We are in the warm water now. Feel it, Martt."

The lake water, fed by boiling springs from all this region, was

noticeably warmer. And every moment the current toward Reaf was

becoming stronger. Martt knew that all this part of the lake converged

to the mouths of the subterranean rivers at Reaf; converged and plunged

under the ground.

* * * * *

The city of Reaf was now in sight. It spread sidewise over an area of

a mile or two. The houses were perched on stilts, like flat, awkward,

long-legged birds squatting in the water.

During all this time Martt and Zee had been watching closely for any

sign of giants. There were none in sight--nothing that seemed alive

over this turgid water, the disconsolate group of houses, the sheer

cliffs with the sullen mountains above them. Two yawning black openings

showed where the rivers entered. . . .

A deserted city, its inhabitants fled. Some had been drowned, the

messenger said. There would be no floating bodies; the current would

have sucked them all into those yawning black mouths. . . . A deserted

city. But somewhere in there among the houses, giants might be

lurking. . . .

Martt said abruptly, "We'd better get the sail down. They can see it

too easily." They were still some two miles from the outskirts of the

city. But no more than half a mile from the nearer shore. It swung past

them to the left; perpendicular black cliffs rising from the water with

a narrow rocky strip along the bottom against which the water sucked.

Zee helped Martt lower the sail. There were poles aboard; the lake here

was no more than five feet deep. They could pole the boat ashore. Walk

unobserved toward the nearer river-mouth. Into the city, to hide among

its buildings.

With a thrill of apprehension Martt realized that they might already

have been seen. But he thought it unlikely. From the hot water, vapor

was rising in a fog. It hung like a white shroud over Reaf. Once in it,

surrounded by the fog, they would be comparatively safe.

"Zee, can you swim?"

"Oh, yes," she said. "But Martt, if you get in the water, be very

careful of the rivers."

Silently they poled the boat to shore. Drew it up from the current,

left it on a shelving rock ledge. The strip here was some ten feet

wide; the hot, black lake in front, sluggishly surging toward Reaf;

and above them the smooth cliff-face.

The wind had turned--a swirling current turned by the mountains. The

fog from Reaf came rolling down upon them. It grew dark; the stars were

obscured. In the humid steam they could see no more than twenty feet.

"Good," said Martt. "This is what we want." He spoke in a half-whisper;

stoutly, but his heart was beating fast. He drew his knife and opened

its blade. "Come on, Zee. And listen, you keep close to me. Whatever

happens, we must keep together. And if you see anything--or hear

anything--don't speak. Just touch my arm."

* * * * *

They started, creeping silently along the rocks in the fog. It seemed

miles. The water was hot beside them. The fog, like a gray curtain,

opened reluctantly before their advance. Presently the ghostly outlines

of houses were visible, a group of them clinging forlornly together

near the shore. Wooden platforms like balconies connected them. A

bridge came over and down to the rocks.

Then other buildings. A large one of two stories, backed against the

cliff-face. Martt and Zee went under it, groping in the blackness among

its piling. The close, heavy air smelt of fish.

They came out to find that the rocky shore had ended. A narrow incline

walk led out and up over the water to another group of ghostly

buildings. They were some thirty feet away, standing on stilts some ten

feet high. In the gray darkness of the fog their shadowy outlines were

barely visible.

Martt stopped. "Zee," he whispered, "how far are we from the nearest

river-mouth?"

"Not far," she said. "Listen."

In the silence he heard the rush of water. As he stood there, suddenly

this whole adventure seemed impractical. There were no giants here.

They had all gone on, up into largeness unfathomable, taking Leela

and Frannie with them. How could he follow? Even if he dared plunge

under the mountains, he could never reach that outer realm. It was

gigantic--compared to his present size it might be a million miles away.

Or, if there were giants still lurking here in Reaf, of what use to

seek them out and be killed by them?

For an instant Martt hopelessly considered turning back. But he never

reached the decision; Zee's fingers gripped his arm--cold, shuddering

fingers. He stared, as he saw her staring, and within him his blood

seemed to stop its flow.

Something was coming down the narrow incline bridge at the foot of

which Martt and Zee were standing frozen, transfixed with horror.

Something . . . in all the dark murk of fog Martt could not make it

out. An animal? It seemed oblong, the size of a large dog. He could see

its moving legs--eight or ten legs, moving as it walked. He felt Zee

stir beside him; he withstood his impulse to run. That would make too

much noise; the thing would bound after them--catch them. . . .

There was a rotting post beside Zee. She and Martt crouched there and

watched with a horrified fascination the thing as it came padding down

the incline. It was vaguely green-white; it seemed luminous. As it

approached, Martt saw it was a sleek body, moving lithe like a panther.

A green-white thing. And then he saw that it was headless. A blunt end,

with a gaping, dripping mouth and a shining green eye on a protruding

stalk. It stopped, turned the eye to look upward and back.

Martt's breath was stopped. In the silence he seemed to hear his own

tumultuously beating heart, and Zee's. The thing was coming on again.

Now Martt could hear sounds from it. A whining; a babbling. And from

the houses, up there at the end of the incline, came another sound. A

great, heavy breathing. A giant was up there asleep! This thing--like

nothing of Zee's world--belonged to the giants! Martt's heart, for all

his horror, leaped with exultation. A giant, asleep! A giant smaller in

size now, if he were up in those houses. He would have the drugs; they

could steal the drugs from him while he slept.

The thing on the incline was quite close. It glowed with its own light,

greenly phosphorescent, like the ghost of something in a dream, leprous

with its missing head.

Another moment. It was passing close beside Martt. A luminous liquid

dripping from the gaping slit of its mouth. Its eye on the stalk peered

ahead. Its voice was clearly audible. A whine; and babbling sounds like

words.

Revulsion, even more than fear, swept Martt. This thing was muttering

words! Animal, or human--it was talking, babbling to itself. Strange

words of an unknown tongue--but human words. Babbling them as though

with reason unhinged. Gruesome! This leprous thing--leprous of body;

and leprous of mind!

It passed within an arm's length of Martt as he crouched. And suddenly,

without conscious thought, he struck at it with his naked knife.

Horrible! The knife sank, but the thing was scarce ponderable! Martt's

hand with the knife went down and through the luminous green body, with

a feeling of warmth and a wet stickiness, but no more.

The force of the blow, unresisted, threw Martt off his balance. He

fell forward, but still clutched the knife. The thing, with a sharp,

horrible cry of pain, lurched backward. Then stood with its eye

quivering, poised for its attack.

_CHAPTER 4_