The Women-Stealers of Thrayx Page 6

told we could not be a civilization without it."

  Mason was silent for a long moment. He did not want to question toodeeply the beliefs sacred to another, yet it was so damnably peculiar.They fought bitterly, and they did not know why.

  "Could you--would you let me see a copy of this Book, Kriijorl?"

  "If I could I'd be glad to, Lieutenant. For I have often wished Icould see the words it contains myself."

  "You've never read it?"

  "Never. Nor has any Ihelian or Thrayxite for thousands of years. Thereis, you must understand, only one Book of the Saints."

  "Just one copy?"

  "Yes. It has long been deemed sacrilege for mortal eyes to view theancient writings. The single copy is kept in a great vault, built ofindestructible metals, and protectively sheathed to last for all Time.The spot above its burial place is marked by a tall spire of stone. Itis jealously protected."

  "You said that its commands commit you and Thrayx to eternal battle.But if you could only read it, you might learn the basic cause of yourconflict--and, knowing, certainly--"

  "The thought has often occurred to me. But, there is even moreprohibiting such an impossible undertaking than the powerful bondageof tradition and belief alone, Lieutenant. And that is the Book's verylocation."

  "And that--?"

  "The subterranean vault in which it rests is guarded in the Forest ofSaarl. And the Forest of Saarl, my friend, is on Thrayx."

  IV

  "It is something completely beyond my understanding," the Ihelian wassaying. The two men stood, each flanked by two guards, at thethreshold of a great ramp which led from the main air lock of theThrayxite ship to the reddish surface of the spaceport upon which ithad landed but minutes before. Mason felt a chill of awed amazement,not because of the unexpected beauty of the verdant hills that rolledin a delicate blend of kaleidoscopic pastels on every side of the'port and as far as the eye could see, nor was it even from the sightof the exquisite towers that rose as though from the heart of somefabled fairyland scant miles to the south.

  "They're all--all _women_!" Mason breathed. "Not a single man!" And helooked quickly to Kriijorl. "You mean you did not know this?"

  "Know? By the teeth of Jhavuul, we never so much as suspected,Lieutenant! We have not looked upon a Thrayxite face for five thousandyears."

  The guards spoke to them tersely in the common tongue of Ihelos andThrayx, although peculiarly accented to Ihelian ears, and Kriijorlgestured with a slight movement of his head to Mason. At a quick pacethey started down the ramp.

  "We're sunk, kid," Mason said. And he saw the heaviness in the greatViking's face. "We'll never make it out of here in a million years.Even if we made a break for it; even if we had our hands free, wherecould we hide? Couldn't make a move. Two men among an entire femalepopulace--"

  He let the sentence trail off as he realized that Kriijorl wasn'thearing him. And as their brief view of Thrayx was terminated by theirentrance into a smaller shuttle-ship, he saw the hint of a smileflicker at the corners of the Ihelian's lips.

  Their captors strapped them into hammocks, and when they had gone toassist others in herding a portion of the Earthwomen aboard the samecraft, Kriijorl finally spoke.

  "I think for the moment their probes may be off us," he said quickly."I was relieved of my own during my unconsciousness, so we're nolonger screened. And the fact that we speak in your tongue does uslittle good. But hear me. If we are being taken where I hope we are,then they are playing into our hands almost as well as we could haveasked. There will be a limited freedom there, and a chance, if we areclever enough, to get to a mentacom installation. A planetary unit ofunlimited range."

  "But among women?" Mason asked, and his throat was dry.

  "That is the point," Kriijorl replied tersely. "We shall be amongmales almost exclusively, save for the Earthwomen and those Thrayxiteswho periodically will be sent to breed."

  "You mean the planetoid that you talked of before...? But I--"

  "Think a moment! Thrayxite is a matriarchy, something we of Ihelosnever suspected. And therefore we erred further--what we believed tobe a labor planetoid is not, of course!"

  "Breeders!"

  "Exactly. And if we can make it to one of their mentacoms, perhaps ourproblem will be solved. Except that--" His voice hesitated, and Masonsaw doubt in the sudden frown. "I--I have no right to sacrifice yourlife nor those of your women. If we were to get to a mentacom it wouldbe to contact my people, to inform them of the planetoid's truenature, so that we may even the score for what was done to our ownbreeders, and perhaps even form a plan to take prisoners to replacethem. But such a message would be intercepted, of course."

  "Hell, we could dodge 'em long enough--"

  "Perhaps we could, Lieutenant. But the ships I summon will be fightingtheir way through a trebled Thrayxite guard--and once within range ofour enemy's breeder satellite, they will have little time to seek usout and effect our rescue. Destruction will have to be immediate. Nowdo you understand?"

  Mason wet his lips. He understood. Death for the breeders. For theEarthwomen. And for themselves.

  "Nuts!" he clipped out. "That means that as far as you're going to beconcerned, I'm just another Ihelian private first class for awhile,not a space-neurotic Earthman! And our girls ... well, I think--Ithink they'd prefer anything to the living death in store forthem--the rotting away of their lives in some infested alien jungle.Anyway, somebody's got to be judge. So let's get this damned thingdoped out!"

  The Ihelian began a reply, but the words were stopped in his throat bythe sudden pressure of acceleration as powerful engines fumbledsuddenly to throbbing life and lifted the Thrayxite craft quicklytoward the eye of a great white sun.

  * * * * *

  For the second time in her life, Judith Kent watched the warpconfigurations of the Large Magellanic Cloud from the far side of theRim; somehow it frightened her, as though some awful deadliness mustlie within it.

  Helplessly, she carried out Cain's orders, and as hopelessly, wonderedof the fate of Lance and Kriijorl. Captives, with the Earthwomen, inthe Thrayxite ship with which Cain was so rapidly closing? Or lyingdead somewhere, as she more than half believed, in the chill wilds ofnorthern Canada? The odds had been so great. She knew that to hopewithout reason was folly, and yet not to hope was no longer to care.

  She twisted away quickly from Cain's muscular arm.

  "What's eating you, duchess? Your conscience giving you trouble, orare you just plain scared?" When she didn't reply, he laughed shortly,and gestured toward the scanner. In it, the slender Thrayxite craftwas growing steadily larger as Cain's swift pursuit gradually foldedthe gap of curved Space between them. "In a couple of minutes, we'llbe ready to talk turkey, sweetheart. They ought to be aware of usright this minute. I think they'll listen to what we have to offer."

  "To what _you_ have to offer!"

  He laughed again. "It's more than Mason ever had! You know, sometimesI think you were torching for that space-happy has-been!"

  She felt the burn of rising color in her cheeks and turned quicklyaway from him.

  "You don't get it yet, do you duchess?" his heavy voice was sayingbehind her. "It's never occurred to you that there are other places tobe beside with your own flock; that there are other men among whom toseek your fortune if the ones you were born among didn't offer theopportunities you expected. What are we among the stars at all for ifit's not to find our destinies anywhere we think they might lie?What's this Big Freedom for, if not to use to some kind of advantage?And me, I'm sick of being a Warrant under worn out space-neuroticslike Mason! And I don't want to end up being one, either!"

  Judith held her lips tight against the thing that surged hotly insideher. There would have to be a way to stop this man. And if thereweren't--How the pampered friends whom she'd left so proudly to choosethis calling would laugh at her, would say "_that was what thehot-headed little rebel deserved ... she had it coming if she couldn'tact like a lady_." And they _were_ wr
ong!

  But this man was hideously twisting all the things she had thoughtwere good and right, worth hoping and striving for. All the pricelessthings that had stood for more than the soft, idle and pointlesslyshallow existence to which she'd been born.

  "But I guess you wouldn't get it," Cain was saying. "Born with asilver shovel in your mouth, you don't have to worry about sweatingout your pile! Quit any time and there it all is after your littleadventure, still waiting for you to come home to! Maybe they'll evenwant you to write a book! But me--my father wasn't a luckyg-prospector."

  A proximity alarm clanged, and Cain quickly turned his attention tothe control banks. He jacked out the auto control and took overmanually. And within seconds the pursuit was hovering over the greatwhale-like back of the Thrayxite craft, and then was drawn slowly toit as its powerful magnetics reached out, ensnared it. Then Cain cutthe pursuit's drive, and they both waited.

  The airlock opened, and the two women stepped through. There wereweapons in their hands.

  "I want to see your commander," Cain barked.

  "I am the commander of this complement," the taller of the two said inan almost unaccented English. "You will consider yourselves mycaptives. Daleb...."

  "What? Not all _women_." There was a curious look on Cain's face;thoughts were racing behind the thin blades of his eyes.

  "You are prisoners of the matriarchy of Thrayx," the officer calledDaleb said. "If you do not resist, you shall be unharmed."

  "All right, come off that alien-meets-alien stuff," Cain said asthough the two briefly-uniformed women before him held toys ratherthan weapons in their hands. "I didn't just tag after you at a billiontimes the speed of light to get thrown into one of your dungeons! I'vegot some information I think you can use. And--" and the curious lookwas again on his face, "--there are some--shall we say--services, Ithink I can profitably perform for you."

  "Profitably, Earthman? Profitable to whom?"

  "To both of us. To me--that's why I'm here--and to you."

  Judith's face was white. Perhaps this was some clever trick of Cain's.She could have been wrong.

  "Tell me this information you have, Earthman."

  "Let's dicker about price, first, Goldylocks!" He stood there,confident, defiant, great muscles bunched beneath the fabric of histunic.

  "You, Earthman, are hardly in bargaining position!" Only the woman'smouth moved; her eyes bored straight into Cain's like fine diamonddrills.

  "Chuck me," Cain said with a grin, "and you chuck the best chanceyou've ever had to take your Ihelian friends to the cleaners. Whatinformation I have concerning Ihelian plans is one thing." Judithcaught her breath. She knew Cain was lying now. Even Lance had learnedlittle of the Ihelian strategy, above Kriijorl's attempt to enlistEarthwomen for Ihelian breeding colonies. It was all, she realizedsuddenly, a colossal bluff, from which Cain planned to play his cardsas he went along! And now he had found a wedge of some sort, some newbargaining point. There was still that curious look on his face, thatcareless grin at his lips. "But what service I can render you," he wascontinuing, "is quite another! Ladies, how good are your teleprobegadgets against an Ihelian screen? A big blank, aren't they? But Istill think you'd give those cute shirts of yours to find out what'sgoing on inside the thick skulls of our Ihelian friends."

  A puzzled look flickered across the Thrayxite commander's face, yetshe remained immobile, and her weapon held steady.

  "First of all, bright eyes," Cain said swiftly, "may you be the firstto know that they're all men! _All men_, get it?" There was a softgasp from Daleb, and the commander's eyes flickered, widened almostimperceptibly. "And better yet, I'm a pal of Kriijorl, their commanderwho picked us up just inside the Rim that time you followed us intoEarth. So think it over. It ought to be worth a fancy little pile toyou, ladies, since women agents would be kind of conspicuous in anall-male civilization!"

  "You expect us to believe this fantasy? Do you expect us to acceptyour proposal on the basis of nothing more than words? And thetechnique you describe. It has never been used, never even consideredas a legitimate method of battle!"

  Cain laughed easily. "Then maybe you better consider it if you want tocome out on top! And as to the rest of it, if I was part of somecounter-plot against you do you think I'd've gone to the trouble ofbringing along some security?" And Judith felt something freeze insideher as he threw a careless glance in her direction. "There sheis--Sergeant Judith Kent. Your hostage for this little operation! If Imisbehave, she should make a pretty good bargaining point with Ihelos.From all I gather, they've got Earth sore enough at them as it is!"

  There was an instant's silence, and then the commander said, "You havenot proven your statement that our enemy is a male enemy."

  "What do you think they wanted women for on Earth after you blastedthat planetoid of theirs? A quilting party or something? Add it up."

  The quiet in the small control bubble was electric. Judith watched theThrayxites' faces as they weighed the incredible thing that Cain hadsaid.

  "I haven't got all eternity!" Cain snapped. "You think you can affordnot to believe me?"

  "Very well. Our Book has never mentioned this technique of spying, andtherefore there can be no rule against it. As for the rest--that couldbe immaterial. You could be of value to us. Outline your plan."

  "That's better, girls. Only take it just a little slower. We both knowwhat we are, but let's haggle for awhile about the price, shall we?"

  V

  Judith shivered, partly from an uncontrollable terror and partly fromthe pre-dawn dampness creeping from the thick jungle surrounding thesmall clearing which held one of the breeder planetoid's many secludedcolonies. The camp and the tangled growth which bounded it was herprison; a place in which there was freedom, yet where none were free.To walk or to run or to hide--but where? And so it was with therest--the hard-muscled, obviously drug-clouded males who had neverknown any other world than this; who never questioned from whence camethe periodic groups of Thrayxite women for them to fertilize; who onlyglared dully at her, dimly understanding that she was to be, althoughcaptive here, left to herself and unmolested. Yet despite her statusas hostage and Earthwoman, she was afraid.

  The brute of a camp leader, Bruhlla.... Not drugged like the rest.There was more to his sidelong glances than curiosity and vagueresentment. Too often, she could sense his eyes upon her. And shewondered at the increasing frequency of his visits to the camp's wellguarded mentacom installation.

  She had lost count of night and days under the white sun of Thrayx andits ringed host. There had been two, perhaps, or three. Three days inwhich Roger Cain had been doing what? Was he with Kriijorl and Lanceposing as their friend, their fellow captive, listening to their plansagainst their Thrayxite captors ... remembering? Or would they befreed, if indeed they still lived, in order that Cain could, withthem, learn even more of Ihelian stratagems on a far greater scale?

  And the Earth girls--she had heard the cries of some, the desperatecurses of others.

  Bruhlla, entitled to use of the mentacom for daily contact reportswith Thrayx as he was, was the only other alien being on the planetoidwho could converse with her. He had lost little time in probing her tolearn her tongue. And he had already hinted at the fate of the womenfrom her planet. In other camps on the planetoid, held in smallisolated groups, unmolested, Bruhlla had said. But prisoners, as wasshe.

  Somehow, the Ihelians would have to know.

  For there was no Earth to which to turn now.

  The shiver again shook her slender body, and her tattered uniform didlittle to shield her from the damp cold.

  "Still one apart from the rest of us, are you?" The growl of Bruhlla'svoice behind her startled her, and she turned quickly to face theloose grimace of derision on his thick lips.

  "I am to be left to myself," she said with what assurance she couldmuster. "That is your order."

  "I know my order, little one! No need to tell Bruhlla his orders! Butperhaps you will grow colder; perhaps you will
grow hungry."

  "You couldn't--"

  "I have no order about feeding you, little one!"

  Somehow she found the strength to voice her defiance. For she couldstill think. And thought, Lance had once told her, was the ultimatestrength....

  "You lie! There was such an order! But if you wish to bring the wrathof your masters down upon your ugly head." She watched his unkemptface, fanned the sudden puzzlement she saw growing in his red,sadistic eyes. If his intelligence were blurred enough by theself-made drug of his lust. "I myself heard such an order; and if youcan prove me mistaken you may do with me what you will!" _God, wouldhe stop to realize that she understood not a word of the Thrayxitetongue?_

  "Quickly proven, my little one! Quickly enough proven! And then ifwhat you say is untrue...." He left the sentence mercifullyunfinished, and turned toward the sturdily-built cubicle that housedthe colony's mentacom.

  "Wait! I'll only believe your proof if I can hear it for myself!"

  "Come along then and you shall hear it!" The thick lips slackened intoa lascivious grin that sickened her, but she hastened to follow him.And he did not see her as she scooped the jagged stone from