Planet Of No Return

10: Taking Charge

“The wound is healing quite well,” Lea said, holding Brion’s hand and turning it back and forth as she looked at the stump of the missing finger. She spread antiseptic cream on the wound while he watched.

“Arb’t klrm,” he said.

“If you are trying to say ‘That hurt’, you’ve got to learn to swallow the terminal sounds a good deal more, or the noisome natives are never going to understand you.”

“It’s a pretty repulsive language.”

“That’s just your linguistic isolationism talking, Brion. Taken abstractly, no language can possibly be repulsive …”

Brion interrupted her with a raised finger, then spoke quietly. “Don’t look now, but Ravn is trying to make a run for it. I’ve been waiting for this. I’ll give him a bit of a lead before I grab him. I want him to run and to feel that he is getting away from us at last. Then, when I grab him again, he should be in despair. Perhaps I can get through to him then when his defence are down, convince him to talk to me. I haven’t wanted to force it up until now. But if he has this much energy I think that he can use some shaking up.”

“Give him an extra shake for me. Whenever he looks at me he has that same disgusted expression that he had when you gave him the cooked meat to eat.”

“His is a very stratified society, you saw that for yourself.”

“Yes. With women somewhere below the bottom. Ahh, there he goes. He’s getting to his feet now, looking in this direction.”

“Turn away as though you don’t see him. I want him to have some hope of escape — before I take it away from him. This should be a traumatic situation that might very well get him off his guard.”

Ravn knew that the Old One Who Talked would not pursue him. He sat always in the same place. And of course the She was of no importance. It was only the big Hunter he feared, for this one’s strength was like that of two men. Yet the chance must be taken now, when the Hunter was not looking. Ravn had eaten and rested. He was the Ravn and still strong in the legs since for many years he had pursued and killed Meat-things. He had outrun them — and now he would outrun the Hunter as well. The Hunter was stupid, not even looking. The Old One was stupid too for he just sat there and gave no alarm. Slowly at first, this was the way, he crept away through the grass — now leap up, fast! Like the wind, like the Meat-things — he would never be caught now.

Lea watched the old man running fleetly across the plain, further and further away. “Aren’t you taking a risk?” she asked. “The old bastard has a good turn of speed. It would be a shame to lose him now. There could be trouble, you might have to fight with his friends. They could be waiting for him out there.”

“Please don’t be concerned. There’s no one waiting, I’m sure of that.” Brion looked after the fleeing man, then stood and stretched. “Sprinting is good exercise. I don’t get enough of it.”

As she watched him, Lea knew that she has been foolish to worry. When Brion began to run she realized that she had never seen him move at top speed before. She had forgotten that he was a world champion athlete, a victor in twenty sports — and this had to have been one of them.

For Ravn it was an unwelcome shock. One instant he had been ready to sing a victory song, having run so far and so fast that he knew that he could never be caught. When he looked back and saw the Hunter beginning to chase him he laughed, going faster himself in order to open the distance. But when he looked again the Hunter had halved the distance — and was still coming on. Ravn wailed in despair and ran, but he could not escape. Heavy footsteps pounded close behind him while the trees were still too distant. His lungs ached, his heart was bursting — a heavy hand fell onto his shoulder and he shrieked aloud and fell.

Brion felt no pity as he looked down at the old man writhing and wailing in the grass. He felt his heart beating strongly after the run, and with each pulsation the stump of his amputated finger throbbed with pain. An uncomfortable reminder that this grovelling creature was the very one who had amputated it. Anger cut through Brion’s pain as he saw that same finger around the filthy creature’s neck, saw the man clutch to the necklace of bones with both hands as he lay there screeching with self pity. Holding on to it as if it gave him strength.

When he saw this, Brion knew what he had to do. He remembered that the ragged lizard skin clothing and crude stone weapons were the only artefacts that these people appeared to have. Other than this necklace. It must be valued highly, or was some kind of honour to wear. Good! In that case he was the one who was going to have it.

Ravn wailed even louder when Brion tried to take the necklace from him, clutching to it desperately with both hands. But Brion’s strength could not be resisted. He seized Ravn’s wrists with his mighty hands and squeezed, numbing them instantly so that the fingers lost their strength and simply fell open. Brion pulled the necklace off over Ravn’s head, then put it slowly on himself. The old man’s waiting gave way to screamed entreaty.

“Mine — give me! I am the Ravn, mine to wear, mine …”

He spoke in his own language and Brion found that he could understand it easily enough. The Heuristic Language Programmer had done its work well. Brion stepped back and placed his hand on the necklace, speaking slowly in the same language.

“It is mine now. I am Brion. While I wear it I am the Ravn.” If Ravn were a title as well as a name this should make sense to the man. And it did. The screaming stopped and Ravn’s eyes narrowed with anger.

“Only one Ravn with the people. Me. Mine.” He extended his hand with a demanding gesture. Brion took the necklace off again but did not release it. “Is this yours?” he asked. “Mine. Give me. Belongs to the Ravn.” “What is a Ravn?”

“l am. I tell you to give it. You are rotten meat, you are shit, you are woman …”

Brion casually took the old man’s neck in one hand and tightened his grip, pulling the man up towards him at the same time, until their faces almost touched. He growled as he spoke.

“You curse me. You do not curse Brion. Who could kill you in an instant by making tighter his fingers — like this.”

Ravn’s body flapped about in agony; he could not breathe or talk and death was very close.

Brion shook him about like a rag, then waved the necklace of bones before his face. “You will tell me what I want to know. Then you will have this back. You understand me? Say yes. Say yes!”

“Yes …” Ravn gasped. “Yes.”

Brion did not let the sensation of victory show in his face. The anger was still in his voice when he dropped Ravn to the ground and sat beside him. His questions were imperative and demanded an answer. Ravn answered them, as best he could, concealing nothing. After a great amount of time had passed his voice became hoarse and his words stumbled one over the other. It was more than enough for a beginning, Brion thought. He was about to return the necklace when he noticed his own amputated finger threaded into place among the bones. It was a part of him — and it must have had some important meaning to these people or they would not have taken it in this manner. Well they weren’t going to get it back. Brion seized the dry flesh of the thing and tore it from the necklace.

“This is mine forever. The rest you can have for now.” Brion hurled the necklace to the ground. “We will now go back to my place. You will talk to me again whenever I wish it.”

Ravn slipped the necklace over his head with trembling hands, then pushed himself to his feet. All rebellion had vanished. Brion knew that from now on the old man would do everything that he was told. As soon as the other’s back was turned Brion let the desiccated finger slip to the ground, happy to be rid of the thing. It had served its purpose.

“Woman, we will eat!” Brion called out in the native language as he led his exhausted prisoner back to their camp. Lea flared her nostrils at his words and tone of voice.

“Does this male chauvinist pig act mean that we are finally getting somewhere with Old Dirty here?”

“It does, my precious one.” He winked as he shouted the words. “Please feed him, then I can put him to bed, after which I will tell you some of the interesting things I have learned.”

“If you don’t mind, we’ll eat separately. I never have got used to his diet of decayed raw meat.”

“I’ve found out about that as well. Let’s feed him and stake him out. I don’t think he’ll give us any more trouble.”

Ravn’s loud snores sounded from the high grass where he had been bedded down for the night — with a braided length of rawhide securing his foot to a stake driven deep into the ground. He would be there when they wanted him.

“They’re primitives,” Brion said, chewing steadily on the dried rations. “Unbelievably primitive in every way, with all of their activities determined by strict taboos. Men are hunters and in control of all activities …”

“Not for the first time in the history of mankind.”

“Agreed. But this an all or nothing society, completely black and white without any shades of grey that I can find so far. The men hunt, and everyone eats what they bring back. Raw, as we know. Eating anything else is taboo. Eating cooked food is taboo. Leaving the forest for the plain is taboo — other than brief forays for hunting. Men may make and use weapons, but anyone else …”

“I know. It’s taboo. Did you find out why they staged that night attack when they captured us?”

“Still the taboo thing. They saw us near the lifeship — and machines appear to be the biggest taboo of all.”

“That might have something to do with the war machines.”

“I’m sure it does, but that’s all I could get out of him at the time.”

“Did you at least discover what was so important about the bone necklace.”

“I think I did. It’s complicated and I didn’t follow some of the words, but it seems to work like this. A man has a spirit, some sort of essential being. Women and children don’t, as you might have guessed. They just die and are forgotten like animals. But if a piece of a man is kept by the Ravn, why then he is considered still alive and part of the tribe, and still subject to the Ravn’s discipline. They were going to kill us in some ritually delightful way because we are taboo. But he was keeping my finger because that way I would always be under his control.”

“Delightful. Does this mean that stashed away someplace they have the finger bones of all their ancestors?”

“Probably. But essentially this sort of logic is no different in principal from all of the other cultures that bury their dead. In fact this is more practical. Just keeping a finger bone is a lot easier than a complete skeleton.”

Lea looked up at the star-filled sky and shivered.

“And these people are descendants of cultured and intelligent human beings. How did this ever happen?”

“I have no idea. Yet.”

“What is the connection between these primitives and the modern warfare we have seen here?”

“I have no idea of the answer to that one either. But I intend to find out. If Ravn doesn’t know, or pretends not to know, then some of the others will tell me. And they may have artefacts that will give us a clue. So this all comes down to the inescapable fact that we will just have to go up into the hills and see them. Find out for ourselves. They have been on this planet for thousands of years, probably since before the Breakup. They must be able to tell us something.”

“You keep saying us. Are you trying to tell me that you intend to risk our necks back at their campsite again?”

“The risk will be minimal this time.” He pointed to the case of weapons. “We go armed and we go by choice.”