THIRD PRISONER
"Well, it as good as new." Shann his hand and arm out into the full path of the sun. He had just off the skin-case bandage, to the of a half-healed scar, but as he muscles, and his arm, there was only a small of left.
"Now what, or where?" he asked Thorvald with some eagerness. Several days' in this room had him for the world again. Like the officer, he now of the green fabric, the only material to the Wyverns, and his own boots. Oddly enough, the Terrans' weapons, and knife, had been left to them, a point which them uneasy, since it that the Wyverns they had nothing to from arms.
"Your is as good as mine," Thorvald answered that question. "But it is you they want to see; they upon it, in fact."
The Wyvern city as a series of cell-like in the of a rock-walled island. Outside there had been no with the natural of the escarpment, and within, the was almost complete. For all the Terrans learn, the population of the stone-walled might have been thousand, or just the that they had with their own along the passages which had been open for them.
Shann to again a skull-walled where to his future. But he came with Thorvald into an room in which most of the was a window. And what in that, Shann halted, again as to he actually saw that, or he was into a by the choice of his hostesses.
They were now than the room in which he had nursed his wound, not above water level. And this window the sea. Across a of green water was his red-purple skull, the its jaw, their in the rock-fringe which its teeth. And from the the clak-claks of the sea coast, and going as if they to some brain that case from the world.
"My dream——" Shann said.
"Your dream." Thorvald had not that; the answer had come in his brain.
Shann his and the Wyvern them with a which was close to the of an stare, a which no friendship. For by her skin patterns he her for the one who had that who had sent him into the of the mist. And with her was the he had on the night that all this action had begun.
"We meet again," he said slowly. "To what purpose?"
"To our purpose ... and yours——"
"I do not that it is to yours." The Terran's easily now into a pattern he would not have used with one of his own kind. "But I do not any good to me...."
There was no on her face; he did not to see any. But in their mind touch he a of on her part, as if she his as hard to as a puzzle with leading clues.
"We you no ill, star voyager. You are more than we you, for you have false and have known. Now true, and know it also."
"Yet," he challenged, "you would set me a without my consent."
"We have a for you, but already it was set in the pattern of your true dreaming. And we do not set such patterns, star man; that is done by the Greatest Power of all. Each her pattern from the First Awakening to the Final Dream. So we do not ask of you any more than that which is already for your doing."
She with that which was a part of their and came to him, a child in size, making his Terran and awkward, in contrast. She out her four-digit hand, her arm with circles and bands, it his own, that scar.
"We are different, star man, yet still are we dreamers. And power. Your you across the dark which sun and sun. Our us on roads. And yonder"—one of her to a point, the skull—"there is another who with power, a power which will us all unless the pattern is speedily."
"And I must go to this dreamer?" His of through that nose was to be then.
"You go."
Thorvald and the Wyvern her to him. "Alone," she added. "For this is your only, as it has been from the beginning. There is for each his own dream, and another cannot walk through it to the pattern, to save a life."
Shann crookedly, without humor. "It that I'm elected," he said as much to himself as to Thorvald. "But what do I do with this other dreamer?"
"What your pattern moves you to do. Save that you do not him——"
"Throg!" Thorvald started forward. "You can't just walk in on a Throg and be by orders such as that!"
The Wyvern must have the of that protest, for her touched them both. "We cannot with that one as his mind is closed to us. Yet he is an among his and his people have been land and sea for him since his air upon the and he entered into over there. Make your peace with him if you can, and also take him hence, for his are not ours, and he to the Reachers when they retire to the Trails of Seeking."
"Must be an Throg," Shann deduced. "They have an officer of the beetle-heads under over there. Could we use him to with the rest?"
Thorvald's did not lighten. "We've been able to any of in the past, though our best minds, by training, have tried...."
Shann did not take fire at that of his own of for the out of with the enemy; he it was true. But there was one thing he try—if the Wyverns permitted.
"Will you give a of power to this star man?" He pointed to Thorvald. "For he is my Elder One and a Reacher for Knowledge. With such a focus his with mine when I go to the Throg, and that can in my doing what I not alone. For that is the of my people, Elder One. We link our powers together to make a against our enemies, a common tool for the work we must do."
"And so it is with us also, star voyager. We are not so as the might think. We learned much of you while you in the Place of False Dreams. But our power are our own and can not be to a while their owners live. However...." She again with an to the Wyvern manner and the older Terran.
The officer might have been an order as he put out his hands and them to on those she up to him, his so met ones. The of which had all three of them snapped. Thorvald and the Wyvern were in a tight which Shann.
Then the of movement him. The Wyvern had joined him to watch the clak-claks in their of the of the island.
"Why do they so?" Shann asked her.
"Within they nest, for their young. Also they the that in the darkness."
"The creatures?" If the skull's was by some other native fauna, he wanted to know it.
By some method of her own the Wyvern a of revulsion, which was her personal to the "rock creatures."
"Yet you the Throg there——" he remarked.
"Not so!" Her was and vehement. "The other into that place in of our calling. There he in hiding. Once we him out to the sea, but he the power and again."
"Broke free—" Shann upon that. "From control?"
"But surely." Her reply something of wonder. "Why do you ask, star voyager? Did you not also free from the power of the when I you by the ways, in the river? Do you then this other one as less than your own that you think him of the same action?"
"Of Throgs I know as much as this...." He up his hand, off a of space thumb and forefinger.
"Yet you them you came to this world."
"My people have them for long. We have met and many times among the stars."
"And have you talked mind to mind?"
"Never. We have for that, but there has been no us, neither of mind of voice."
"This one you name Throg is not as you," she assented. "And we are not as you, being and female. Yet, star man, you and I have a dream."
Shann at her, startled, not so much by what she said as the of those in his mind. Or had that also been illusion?
"In the ...that which came to you on when you that. A good dream, though it came out of the past and so was false in the present. But I have it into my own store: such a dream, one that you have cherished."
"Trav was to be cherished," he soberly. "I her in a sleep at a when I was a child. We were cold and hungry, alone and hurt. So I and was that I Trav. For a little space we were very happy...." Forcibly he memory.
"So, though we are in and in mind, yet we together if only in a dream. Therefore, your people and mine there can be a common speech. And I may you my store for your enjoyment, star voyager."
A of pictures, some weird, some beautiful, all a little distorted—not only by haste, but also by the of which was a part of her memory pattern—crossed Shann's mind.
"Such a would be a rich feast," he agreed.
"All right!" Those in his own Shann away from the window to Thorvald. The Survey officer was no longer locked hand to hand with the Wyvern witch, but his were alive with a new eagerness.
"We are going to try your idea, Lantee. They'll provide me with a new, disk, me how to use it. And I'll do what I can to you with it. But they that you go today."
"What do they want me to do? Just out that Throg? Or try to talk him into being a go-between with his people? That come under the of dreaming!"
"They want him out of there, with his own if possible. Apparently he's a for them; he some of a up which with their 'power.' They haven't been able to him to make any with them. This Elder One is about your being the one for the job, and that you'll know what action to take when you there."
"Must have the for me again," Shann commented.
"Well, they've definitely you to out the Throg, and they can't be talked into their minds about that."
"I'll be the one if he has a blaster."
"They say he's unarmed——"
"What do they know about our or a Throg's?"
"The other one has no arms." Wyvern in his mind again. "This him great fear. That which he has upon is broken. And since he has no weapon, he is into a prison of his own terrors."
But an adult Throg, unarmed, was not to be easy meat, Shann thought. Armored with skin, with and those of the mouth ... a third again as tall as he himself was. No, unarmed, the Throg had to be a menace.
Shann was still along that line as he through the which about the of the island, up one of the pointed which as a tooth, and for a higher to lead him to the nose slit, the to the alien's place.
The clak-claks and about him, of his intrusion. And when they so as to him with their wings, him with their beaks, he was to the his door and inside. Once there, Shann looked back. There was no the window where Thorvald stood, was he aware in any way of with the Survey officer; their of such a might be futile.
Shann was to farther. His had to the limited supply of light, and now the Terran out the one the Wyverns had him, a green such as those which had played the role of on the roof. He its setting to the of his belt, his hands free. Then, having his for the last time with clean, sea-washed air, he started into the of the skull.
There was a to this air only a away from the world. The odor of clak-clak and from their was strong, but there was an added staleness, as if no out the old to replace it with new. Fragile under Shann's boots, but as he away from the entrance, the of the its radiance, a light not that of the bushes, so that he was not up by dark.
The the nose into a cleft, a narrow which into the bowl of the skull. Shann with caution, every steps. There came a now and again to a shriek, issuing, he guessed, from the clak-clak above. And the of sea was also a through the rock. He was for something else, at the same time the ill-smelling air for that which Throg.
When a in the narrow passage cut off the of daylight, Shann his stunner. The from that not a Throg into complete paralysis, but it would slow up any attack.
Red—pinpoints of red—were a in the wall. They were gone in a flash. Eyes? Perhaps of the which the Wyverns hated? More red dots, ahead. Shann for a he identify.
But came sound. That of which in a Terran, was his guide. The ended in a space to which the limited of the not provide a wall. But that light did him his quarry.
The Throg was not on his feet, for trouble, but close to the wall. And the did not move at Shann's coming. Did the beetle-head him? Shann wondered. He moved cautiously. And the head, with its eyes, a fraction; the about the the mouth opening quivered. Yes, the Throg see him.
But still the no move to out of his crouch, to come at the Terran. Then Shann saw the of rock, the which a double-kneed leg to the floor. And in a circle about the were the small, crushed, which had come to on the to be themselves by the well-aimed which were the Throg's only of defense.
Shann his stunner. It was plain the Throg was and not him. He to on a picture of the him, that Thorvald or one of the Wyverns it up. There was no answer, no direction. Choice of action his.
The Terran the of his kind; his empty hands up, out. There was no move from the Throg. Neither of the other's upper stirred, their still the small in for throwing. All Shann's knowledge of the alien's history against an advance. The Throg's marksmanship, as out by the circle of small bodies, was excellent. And one of those might well against his own head, with results. Yet he had been sent there to the Throg free and out of Wyvern territory.
So rank was the of the other that Shann coughed. What he needed now was the of the wolverines, a to keep the busy. But this time there was no to produce Taggi and Togi out of thin air. And he not continue to just there at the Throg. There the stunner. Life on the Dumps to make a man a fast draw, a of for the and most marksman. And now one of Shann's hands with a speed which, learned early, was to be forgotten.
He had the out and was on tight at the Throg's the his and his from a hand. But a second out of the Throg's claw. The to for it, his movements slow, uncertain.
Shann, his arm dangling, in fast, his good against the which the Throg. The a at the Terran's head, but again so slowly Shann had no in it. The gave, rolled, and Shann out of range, to the opening of the cleft, only to up his stunner.
For a long moment the Throg no move; his must have been at very slow speed. Then the up his to erect, the leg which had been trapped. Shann tensed, waiting for a rush. What now? Would the Throg to move? If so, what he do about it?
With the impact of a blow, the message Shann had for into his mind. But his at that was out with the same speed.
"Throg ship ... overhead."
The Throg away from the wall, out, for Shann, or only the in which he stood. Swinging the in his left hand, the Terran retreated, trying to Thorvald once more. There was no answer. He was well up into the cleft, moving crabwise, to turn his on the Throg. The was as as his would allow, trying for the to the world.
A Throg ship overhead.... Had the somehow managed to call his own kind? And what if he, Shann Lantee, were to be the and a landing party from the flyer? He did not any from the Wyverns, and what Thorvald possibly do? From him, at the entrance of the nose slit, he a sound—a which was neither the of a clak-clak the of the sea.
