Strata

end of the cable from Silver. ‘All ready? Soon people will overcome their fears.’
    They rose quickly. Marco hovered fifty metres up and looked down at the demon, a tall shadow in the moonlight. Sphandor shrugged. The big wings unfolded.
    ‘ I SHALL REQUIRE A RUN TO TAKE OFF. ’
    Kin watched Marco bob above him as the demon loped across the ground, the wide wings rattling. Halfway across he brought them down with a whump that threw up a dust cloud, and he hung there for several seconds while the wings hammered on the air. Then he rose ponderously, like a giant heron.
    When he was level with them, but a hundred metres away, he took a length of cable in his talons.
    ‘ FAREWELL, FOOLS !’ he bellowed, and tugged. A look of dismay crept over his face.
    With the belt’s lateral stabilizers full on Marco hung immovable in the air. When he reeled in the line no amount of wing flapping could budge him. When the horned head was just a few metres away the kung whispered: ‘I’m told you can read minds …’
    ‘ ONLY SURFACE THOUGHT, LORD .’
    ‘Read mine.’
    After a second Sphandor’s face was a mask of terror.
    With the creature in tow they moved slowly, because the wide wings acted as an air brake. The demon held a loop of cable in both hands and glided behind them unsteadily, peppering them alternately with entreaties and curses.
    The smoke no longer dominated the sky. It
was
the sky. Winds in the upper air had teased it out into a ragged mushroom.
    Apart from the background noise behind them they flew in silence, Kin and Silver following a little behind Marco. Finally Kin’s radio chimed.
    ‘This is Silver, transmitting on your suit frequency only, Kin. You had something to say? If you move the switch to position four Marco will not hear,’ the voice added.
    ‘Silver, he slaughtered them! They didn’t have a chance!’
    Silver made a noncommittal noise. ‘They outnumbered him ten to one.’
    ‘They weren’t expecting a kung, damn it!’ Kin felt the bottled up words rushing to be said. ‘He enjoyed it! You saw him, he even killed ones who were running away, he threw … their only crime was that they happened to be in his way, it was completely inhu—’ She choked on the word.
    After a while Silver said: ‘Quite.’
    Kin thought about the first contact with the kung. Men had already met the shandi, who apart from their duelling had no concept of warfare and viewed mankind’s ragged history with barely-concealed horror. So the first ship to land on Kung had no weapons aboard at all.
    Five deaths served to convince men that, considered on the galactic scale, they were gentle and peace-loving. Perhaps it had been worth it.
    ‘We all think we understand each other,’ Kin heard Silver say. ‘We eat together, we trade, many of us pride ourselves on having alien friends – but all this is only possible, only possible, Kin, because we do not fully comprehend the other. You’ve studied Earth history. Do you think you could understand the workings of the mind of a Japanese warrior a thousand years ago? But he is as a twin to you compared with Marco, or with myself. When we use the word “cosmospolitan” we use it too lightly – it’s flippant, it means we’re galactic tourists who communicate in superficialities. We don’t comprehend . Different worlds, Kin.Different anvils of gravity and radiation and evolution.
    ‘If that winged creature is used to reading human minds, no wonder Marco’s terrified it.’
    Marco’s voice cut in, spiky with suspicion.
    ‘What are you two talking privately about?’
    ‘Female hygiene,’ said Silver crisply. ‘Marco, shouldn’t we land again? We should interrogate this creature.’
    ‘I agree. I will watch for a suitable site. I am sorry to have interrupted your conversation.’ There was a click as he switched out.
    There was a noise that might have been a shand chuckling. Then Silver said, ‘There is another minor matter, Kin. Are ravens a very common bird?’
    ‘Hmm? I don’t think so. Why?’
    ‘There has been one in the sky ever since we left Eirick. Sometimes it merely tags behind, sometimes it flies a parallel course.’
    ‘It could be just coincidence,’ said Kin doubtfully.
    ‘We’ve been flying at well over a hundred miles an hour at times, Kin.’
    ‘Good grief! You mean it’s keeping up with us?’
    ‘Yes. No, don’t try and find it. It’s well beyond human visual range, as it doubtless intends. It’s only by accident I saw it