[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
all the ones leading here meant a simple 'Keep Out.' What I can't figure out
is why they'd go to all this trouble and then have nobody here permanently no
high priests, no holy guards, nothin'. This place is obviously used and well
maintained, yet there's nobody here. It's just too damned deserted."
Dura looked around and shook her shaggy head. "I have been wondering if
perhaps the people did not simply vanish as we approached. Hiding in the lake,
perhaps."
Maria went over to a barren area and dropped to one knee, studying the ground.
"I find it interesting that even though it rains as much here as elsewhere on
this world, there are no tracks. No footprints at all.
The road and the paths here are well worn, yet there is no sign of prints.
Why?"
Raven stood back and thought about it. "Gobanifar," he said at last.
All heads turned to him in puzzlement.
"He's nocturnal. Oh, he gets around well enough in the daytime, but he can't
stand direct sunlight and he's mostly blind in full daylight. This is a pretty
nasty sun. Suppose these people live in and under the water by day, then come
up at night? Suppose the sun would injure, maybe kill them? If you lived or
hunted or whatever in those seas, with that plankton or whatever it is hiding
most of the sun and keeping what's below pretty dark, you'd probably be pretty
damned sensitive to the sun's rays, wouldn't you?
Page 66
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
And if you could see at all down there, imagine what daylight would do. The
only thing that doesn't figure is that this stuff implies air breathers, yet
there's no sign of them surfacing for air or even skirting the tops of the
waves."
"It makes sense," Dura agreed. "As to the tracks if they're really sea
creatures, maybe they don't have much to make tracks with. Suppose they don't
have legs."
Raven went over to one of the worn tracks and bent down and examined it. It
was pretty much the size of an average human, and the worn depression was deep
and yet oddly shaped, almost straight along the sides. "Could be," he agreed.
"If they had to drag their bodies behind them they'd wipe out any handprints
or whatever. But if they're designed for the water, why come out of it at all,
particularly to this
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
elaborate setup?"
"Takya's people live entirely in the sea," Dura noted, "yet they build and
maintain structures on rocky outcrops, some very elaborate. The people of
Chanchuk are also water creatures yet they build in it and live above it."
"Perhaps it's simply out of some memory of who and what they used to be,"
Maria suggested. "Or perhapsthey do not come here often. This might be used
only for high religious purposes, for marriages and funerals or for other holy
things. Many ancients had their gods living in the sky. If you lived in the
darkest of waters, and only came out at night, would not the land be the
dwelling place of the gods? This world is generally more cloudy than clear and
has no moon. Think about it."
"Yeah, but if they see in the dark, if they see like we do at all, then why
all the torches and fire pots?"
Raven mused. "Unless... fire would be almost a sacred thing to a water culture
that only once in a while came up on land. Yeah. Brightness and fire. Makes
sense." He thought for a moment. "Now we come to the hard part. I don't know
about you, but I don't think I want to get caught in here in the dead of night
even if we can outrun 'em and outfly 'em. Still this is it. This is where we
got to get some kind of contact going. The first step is to find out just what
the hell these people are like."
Maria looked around. "I kind of doubt they could climb trees, although they
probably would have some means of knocking someone out of them if they had to.
They harvest those fruits and coconuts somehow, I think. If someone could stay
up there, though, with a flight pack, infrared viewer perhaps tied in to a
communications link, and remain very, very quiet, perhaps all night... it
might be a start."
Raven grinned. "Nice assignment. I don't notice anybody rushing to volunteer."
"I will do it," said Dura Panoshka. "My people are born in the trees."
Raven nodded. "Agreed for tonight. I think one of us can get back over to
camp, recharge, and get back here with the necessary equipment with time to
spare before dusk. But this isn't someplace they visit every night. It might
take a week, maybe a month. Who knows?" He looked around. "Han Li, I think
this is oneduty that you are excused from.
You can remain still for that long but frankly you are too heavy for those
trees to support. Maybe Gobanifar is gonna do more than he figured after all.
As for the rest of us we'll all take turns until somebody gets lucky."
Pictures of the holy place were taken and transmitted back to
Thunder through the communications link.
Everyone was fascinated, although the regular data bases had nothing specific
about the totems or the design of the place. It remained for Clayben to make
the best guess.
"The totems aren't northwestern American, that is certain," he said. "It is
the wrong sort of setting for them, and isn't consistent with any of the
cultures known to Raven or Hawks. So many of the totems are really statues I
Page 67
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
think we were thrown by the totem pole aspect of the entry guardians. Most of
the ones inside are single deities, and some are even repeated many times. The
squid-faced thing, and the creature that is all mean red eyes and teeth.
Animism, yes, but not Amerind. The wood and the technique are wrong. I would
say Polynesian, perhaps Melanesian. South Pacific. The layout of the place
very much resembles the Polynesian heiau.
If so, these are going to be tribal people, with many gods based on nature,
very fierce, possibly if not probably including human sacrifice and,
potentially, even ritual cannibalism."
Hawks shook his head. "You mean virgins into volcanoes and all that?"
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
"Not that way, although that's the old image. Think of the Aztecs and Mayans.
Like them, sacrifice was never a girl their culture was very male-oriented.
Young men, possibly the prime of manhood. None of our people would be
sacrificed, though. They would be flayed alive, their hearts perhaps removed,
and parts of them consumed to gain the mana of the enemy. That's if they don't
consider our people gods.
Ancient Hawaiians mistook the earliest European explorers for gods simply
because they had white skin and Caucasian features. Of course, when one of
them cut himself or bruised himself or had any misfortune, they changed their
minds and attacked. They were an ignorant, insular people but they weren't
stupid."
On the island of the heiau, the advance party went through nine days of night
watches. Several times there seemed to be movement about the island, either in
the direction of the beach or, now and then, in the direction of the lake, but
nothing came near enough to be seen if, indeed, they were not figments of
imaginations that were both nervous and bored at the same time. Still, Raven
was certain that the wait would not be indefinite; one did not build such
places for use only once or twice a year, and the area was too well
maintained. Indeed, by day there were signs that some of the ripe fruit from
particular groves had been harvested.
On the tenth night it was Raven's turn once more, and he hated it. He
certainly had counted on something happening before he had to take another
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]