“I’ll run a good charge through the hull. That ought to keep off any late-night visitors.”
“It would be delighted to sleep so quietly,” Tyl agreed.
“Then it’s settled. We owe ourselves the rest,” Etienne declared. “First thing tomorrow morning we’ll go Upriver to the source so I can get my samples. With luck this ice may predate the collision that created the Groalamasan. That will give me plenty to do on the way back Downriver.”
“You did enough griping about the heat down south to fill a book, and now you can’t wait to get back to it,” Lyra chided.
“I’ve always been cold-natured, Lyra, you know that. It doesn’t mean I enjoy sweating down to skin and bones, though.” For a change the argument was friendly. In its own way that was as great an accomplishment for the two of them as was reaching the head of the Skar.
Lyra was sound asleep when the muffled scream woke her. She blinked as her head lifted from the pillow and she stared across the cabin. Soft green lights from ship’s instrumentation lit the darkness. A soft wheeze alongside indicated that her husband still slept.
The scream had barely faded and she was beginning to wonder if she’d dreamed it when suddenly a cluster of the green lights changed to red and a warning horn started to blare. Etienne woke instantly, slid off the bed and struggled with his pants.
“False alarm?”
“I don’t know,” she told him, still straining to hear. “I thought I heard something yell.” The horn continued its racket as a soft knocking sounded at the door. Lyra opened it as she fought with the seals of her blouse.
“What is happening?” Tyl asked sleepily. The remaining Tsla clustered in the corridor behind him. “There are strange noises outside and Swd thinks he smells something even though we know we are protected from the air outside.”
“Noises and smells and you think you heard something,” Etienne muttered as he sealed his coat. “That settles it.” He pushed past Tyl on his way to the cockpit.
The light of three of Tslamaina’s four moons poured through the transparent plexalloy. The horn continued to shout as Etienne strained to check the instruments. “Don’t see anything outside. No abnormal readings. We haven’t moved from where I parked us yesterday evening and the hull’s still electrified.”
“I’ll check astern,” Lyra told him. She removed her pistol from its charging slot.
“Watch yourself,” Etienne admonished her.
With the Tsla following curiously she worked her way aft. There was no sign of Homat, but that didn’t worry her. Anything less than a complete upset of the boat would not be enough to pry him from the comfort of his overheated cubicle.
Cautiously she cracked the stern doorway. Freezing air brought her all the way awake. The rumble and gurgle of the shallow river was the only sound as she stepped out onto the rear deck.
A glance forward showed only darkness. There was no movement in the upper reaches of the cavern. Outside only the moons moved in patient procession against the sky. Something shorted out, she thought, wondering if some other strange local critter was somehow playing havoc with their instrumentation.
A heavy weight landed on her right shoulder. She went down hard. The asynapt went flying across the deck. A big chunk of dead log lay next to her.
The Na who had thrown it now peered over the gunwale, eyes glittering in the moonlight. Several similar hairy faces joined the first. One huge, muscular arm reached over the top of the railing and Yij disappeared over the side.
Tyl and Yulour took Lyra under the arms and hauled her toward the doorway. A second club flew toward them. It landed short, booming across the metal deck.
Through the wash of pain that radiated from her shoulder Lyra gasped, “The gun … get my gun!” The source of the scream must have been a Na who’d made contact with the electrified hull as it tried to board the hydrofoil.
Careful not to touch the metal another Na took aim with an axe. The bone blade was a meter across. At the last instant Swd lunged into its path, to fall gushing blood and life back against Lyra, the weapon’s intended target. Yulour had to kick the nearly split body aside as they fell inside.
Etienne was there to help, his eyes on Lyra’s shoulder where the club had struck. She moaned when he touched her.
He closed the hatch, then ordered her to move her right arm.
“Hurts like hell, but it works,” she told him.
“Rotate,” he said curtly. She did so, turning the arm palm up, then palm down. “Lucky you.”
“Not so lucky,” she told him painfully. “My pistol’s outside. That’s twice I’ve lost it when I needed it most. Going to have to work on my grip.” She glanced at Tyl. “Did you see where it landed?”
“The lightning thrower flew through the air. I saw not where it landed.”
“The little metal tool,” Yulour mumbled frantically, trying to keep abreast of what was happening, “I saw where it is.”
“Why didn’t you go after it?” Lyra asked him. “I told you to go after it.”
Yulour looked away, hurt. “We were more concerned with saving thee, Lyra,” Tyl told her. He looked at the porter and said gently. “It’s all right, Yulour. Tell us where the lightning thrower landed.”
“In the water,” he said brightly.
“Oh hell!” Lyra looked up at her husband. “I’m sorry, Etienne, I’m sorry. I never saw them. We went out on deck, everything seemed normal, and then something landed on me like back taxes.”
“Never mind that now. Just take it easy with that shoulder.”
Something went whang atop the cabin and everyone looked upward, but the metal held. Thin as it was, the alloy was far too tough to yield to mere bone and stone.
“What will we fight them with?” Tyl wondered. “It is dark and they are very close.”
“We don’t have to fight them with anything, Tyl. Help Lyra forward.”
Outside the cockpit was a choice scene from Dante. The hydrofoil was surrounded by at least thirty of the towering aborigines, who were jumping up and down, howling and spitting and gesturing angrily at the boat. The Na carefully avoided all contact with the hull and when one of them attempted to express his feelings by urinating on it, they no longer tried that either. They did use long spears and the ubiquitous clubs to hammer on the sides. The wood and stone were poor conductors and the Na had discovered they could flail away at the hull without risk to themselves.
As the Redowls watched, one especially massive warrior tried to vault over the railing. He didn’t quite make it and grabbed a hold with his hands. His lower body slammed into the hull and he lit up in a shower of blue sparks. When the thick fingers finally let loose the huge body splashed into the river.
Etienne assumed the pilot’s chair, his fingers flying over the controls. A muffled roar sounded aft as the engine came to life. The hydrofoil lifted half a meter on its repellers and shot forward, scattering Na. One didn’t dodge quickly enough, and a sickening thud sounded from the bow as the aborigine was knocked aside.
