Beyond the Gate

Chapter 19

As night fell, Zell’a Cree ambled along the rutted roads east of Battic. His Amen had been following the road since just after dawn, sniffing for the scent of Gallen O’Day and his party. They’d crossed forty kilometers of mountain, hugging the coast, and never caught a whiff of him.

Forty kilometers seemed too far. Zell’a Cree knew that the currents and the wind had carried the little lifeboat east along the coast, and for a good time, he’d kept them in sight as he swam.

Still, they should have landed somewhere closer to Battic. But Zell’a Cree’s nose didn’t lie: they hadn’t set foot on the road.

They’re learning, Zell’a Cree realized. They must have known that if they walked on the road, I would catch their scent. And the coastline here was so rocky in places, that Zell’a Cree could not easily hunt them by following the beach.

He wondered idly how it would be to be a human-living in a world where the senses were so limited, where sight and smell and hearing were so dull. Humans must feel terribly vulnerable, terribly open to attack, and they would have to be wary at all times. No wonder they had developed fear as a basic component of their emotional makeup.

Yet Zell’a Cree could hear a twig snap a mile away, and at night, even in a deep fog, the heat of living things blazed like torches. Zell’a Cree did not need to suffer from mankind’s irrational fears. He was better than that.

At dusk, he stopped, weary to the bone, and said to the three other men, “It may be that we have passed the Tharrin’s trail. I for one believe that we should go back.”

“Bransoon told us to head east. He’s first mate,” a sailor grumbled, a small red-skinned man with yellow eyes.

“But we’ve been walking all day, and still have no sign of them,” Zell’a Cree said. “Don’t you think it likely that we passed them already?”

“Maybe,” the sailor said, scratching his ear with a long knife. “But what if you’re wrong? What if they’re a kilometer down the road, or five kilometers? The wind and current are strong. Maybe they decided to follow the coast by boat. If they’re ahead of us, and we turn back now, we could lose them. But if they’re behind us, most likely they’ll just come down the road right into our arms.”

Zell’a Cree studied the men. It seemed just as likely to him that Gallen and the others would run off into the woods and never be found again. There were hundreds of small hamlets scattered throughout these mountains, with roads going everywhere. It would be easy to lose them on back roads.

The three sailors seemed nervous, and they kept looking east, as if in a hurry to be off. “I’m not sure that you men want to find Gallen,” Zell’a Cree said. “I think you’re afraid of him.”

One sailor licked his lips. “It’s not healthy to tangle with him, that’s for sure. What can four of us do against him?”

And Zell’a Cree had to admit that tangling with the Lord Protector had proven to be an unhealthy pastime.

“Aye,” the others agreed. “We’re heading east, and when we find the next town, we’ll notify someone in authority that Gallen may be coming. Then I for one will sit and have a long beer, and thank my ancestors to be quit of this mess.”

Zell’a Cree saw his mistake. He couldn’t trust these men to hunt Gallen properly. In all likelihood, the first mate and his men would just as soon never meet Gallen again, either. But there was a reason why Zell’a Cree had been given his own hunting pack to lead. He had to trust his own wits, his own instinct. “I’m going back,” Zell’a Cree said, “to check the road again.”

And he turned back, heading west. It was cool under the trees at night. Even for a Tosken it had been a long day. He felt worn through, but he picked up his pace and began jogging along the road.

At a farmhouse, he suddenly caught the scent. Gallen, Maggie, Orick, and some others had come out of the road here, just minutes ago. And the smell of Im giants was heavy all around. In the dark, he could see warm glowing footprints where someone had stood by the road for a bit-a giant-waiting for the others to come.

But at the roadside, the scent suddenly became very weak. Gallen and the others were not walking, they were riding.

And Zell’a Cree detected the heavy, malodorous fur of a travelbeast. Since the creature had not passed him, it must have gone west toward Battic.

Zell’a Cree redoubled his efforts, running over the hills, pumping his legs with a fury. If Gallen had fallen in with Im giants, and if he had a travelbeast, then any creature afoot would be hard-pressed to catch them.

So he ran as if to outrace the wind; Zell’a Cree stretched his legs, letting them pump in steady rhythm, the sweat pouring down his face. “I am Tosken, I am Tosken,” he repeated over and over as he pounded the dirt roads, racing under trees past farmhouses where dogs rushed out barking and snapping and then finally fell back in defeat when they tired. Zell’a Cree’s mind retreated from thought until there was only the race.

He heaved great, gasping breaths. He’d been made for great strength and great endurance, but he had not been formed to breathe such thin air as this planet offered. Most times, it did not bother him, but running, the constant pumping of legs, wore him down.

In an hour, he reached Battic, and dared not take the tunnel into the city-not if Gallen was with the Im giants. At Battic one road branched south, and the first mate and his men were to have followed that road. A second road went west.

Zell’a Cree scrambled over the hills, until he found the exit heading south, and there he did not find Gallen’s scent. Which meant that Gallen had anticipated an ambush, and he was circling around it.

Zell’a Cree raced through the woods till he reached a hillside above the west road. There the woods had burned away in ages past, and only low brush survived on the stark, windswept hillsides. He could see parts of the road for six kilometers, and there, at the edge of his vision, burned the forms of the racing giants as they sprinted down the road, protecting their wagon.

Suddenly, the wagon stopped. The giants waited for a moment, glancing about anxiously.

A man climbed up in the back of the wagon and stood looking toward Zell’a Cree. He wore a dark robe, and wore a sword at his back. Gallen O’Day.

To most peoples, even the Im giants, Zell’a Cree would be invisible at this time of night, at such a distance. But Zell’a Cree had been running, and he imagined that the heat of his own body must be radiating like a torch. Yet of all those below, only Gallen O’Day could see him.

The tricky little man could see in infrared. Zell’a Cree had had no idea that the Lord Protector possessed such talents.

They stood for a moment, gazing at one another across the distance, and Gallen raised an arm, as if to wave, then suddenly clenched his fist, drawing it downward-one of the secret hand gestures of the Inhuman-a beckoning call. Then the wagon lurched forward, the travel beast rushing over a hill, and was gone.

For one moment, hope flickered in Zell’a Cree. If Gallen knew the hand signal, then he had been infected by the Inhuman. The Word had indeed entered him.

Yet something was wrong. If Gallen was Inhuman now, then why did he run? Why did he not bring the others so that they too could be converted? The only answer seemed to be that Gallen had been strong enough to resist the Word. Had Gallen beckoned him in mockery?

Zell’a Cree licked his lips, angry. Sweat poured down his face, and he gulped for air. He’d been two days without sleep, and he’d just run twenty kilometers. He could go no farther tonight. He let himself collapse into a sitting position.

So Gallen O’Day was not as blind and helpless as other men. He had more resources to draw upon … and he had resisted the Word.

Zell’a Cree considered his own resources. He imagined the roads south, drew a map in his mind. The Inhuman, had given him a great gift-the memories of a hundred lives lived and wasted. Over six thousand years of memories. Twelve of those lives had been spent in cities and villages between Battic and Moree. He recalled childhoods spent playing on obscure tracks, the life of a tinker working between towns, the days of a Thoranian guard who traveled with a tax collector. Zell’a Cree concentrated, recalling each road, each main track.

Gallen might go far west to avoid detection, but he was in a hurry. If he went too far, he’d have to cross the Telgood Mountains, and that would cost him many days. At the most, Gallen could go four hundred kilometers out of his way, but then he’d have to go south, closer to the hosts of the Inhuman.

Sooner or later he’d turn up on the road to Moree. Zell’a Cree had no choice but to race south now, checking for Gallen’s trail, hoping to enlist other servants of the Inhuman in his quest.

Perhaps I’ve been too naive, Zell’a Cree considered. I’d hoped to take Gallen alive, but he really isn’t as essential as Maggie and the Tharrin. The practical thing would be to kill him.

Once the decision was made, Zell’a Cree felt an enormous calm.

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