Andre Norton - Hosteen Storm 02 - Lord of Thunder

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LORD OF THUNDER

By Andre Norton

Scanned by BW-SciFi

An Ace Book, by arrangement with Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc.

CHAPTER ONE

Red ridges of mountains, rusted even more by the first sere breath of the Big Dry, cut across the

lavender sky of Arzor north and east. At an hour past dawn, dehydrating puffs of breeze warned of the

new day's scorching heat. There would be two hours—maybe three, yet—during which a man could ride,

though in growing discomfort. Then he must lie up through the blistering fire of midday.

The line camp was not too far ahead. Hosteen Storm's silent communication with the powerful young

stallion under him sent the horse trotting at a steady pace, striking out over a strip of range where yellow

grass waved high enough to brush a rider's leg. Here and there Storm spied a moving blot of blue, the outer

fringe of the grazing frawn herd. His sense of direction had not failed him when he took this short cut; they

were nearing the river. In the Big Dry no animal strayed more than half a day's distance from a sure supply

of water.

But he had come close to the edge of prudence in staying so long in the hills this time. One of the two

canteens linked to his light saddle pad was as dry as the sun-baked rocks at his back, had been so since

midmorning of the day before, and the other held no more than a good cup and a half of water. The

Norbies, those wide-ranging hunters native to this frontier world, had their springs back in the mountain

canyons, but their locations were clan secrets.

Perhaps here and there an off-world settler would be accepted by a clan to the point of sharing water

knowledge. Logan might—Hosteen's well-marked black brows pulled in a fleeting frown as he thought of

his Arzoran-born half-brother.

When Hosteen had landed on Arzor a half planet-year earlier, a veteran of the Confederacy forces

after the Xik war, it was as a homeless exile. The last battle of that galaxy-wide holocaust had been a

punitive raid to turn Terra into a blue, radioactive cinder. He had had no idea then that Logan Quade existed

or that Brad Quade—Logan's father—could be any more to him than a man he had once sworn to kill.

In the end, the hate-twisted oath demanded of him by his grandfather on Terra had not made Storm a

murderer after all. It had been broken just in time and had led him to what he needed most—new roots, a

home, kin.

Only happy endings did not always remain so, Hosteen knew now. His emotion was more one of

exasperation than disappointment. Though he had appeared to drop into a place already prepared to contain

him as easily as his vanished Navajo kinsmen used to fit a polished turquoise into a silver setting, yet

another stone in that same setting had come loose during the past few months,

To most riders, the daily round of duties on a frontier holding were arduous enough. There were the

dangerous reptilian yoris to hunt down, raiders from the wild Nitra tribe of the Peaks to keep off, a hundred

and one other tangles with disaster or even sudden death to be faced. But none of that satisfied Logan. He

was driven by a consuming restlessness, which pulled him away from a half-done task to seek out a Norbie

camp, to join one of their wide ranging hunts, or just to wander back into the hills.

There was a flicker of black just within eye range in the sky. Hosteen's lips pursed as if for a whistle,

though no sound issued from between their sun-cracked, blood-threaded surfaces. The black dot spiraled

down.The stallion halted without any outward command from his rider. With the peerless swoop of her

kind, Baku, the great African Eagle, came in to settle on the pronged rest that formed the horn of Hosteen's

specially designed trail saddle. The bird was panting, her head turned a little to one side as one bright and

keen-sighted eye regarded Hosteen steadily.

For a long moment they sat so in perfect rapport. Science had fostered that link between man and

bird, had tested and trained man, bred, tested, and trained bird, to form not just a team of two very different

life forms but—when the need arose—part of a smoothly working weapon. The enemy was gone; there

was no longer any need for such a weapon. And the scientists who had fashioned it had vanished into ash.

But the alliance remained as steadfast here on Arzor as it had ever been on those other worlds where a

sabotage and combat team of man, bird, and animals had operated with accurate efficiency.

"Nihich'i hooldoh, t'assh 'annii ya?" Hosteen asked softly, savoring the speech that perhaps he alone

now along the stellar lanes would ever speak with fluency. "We're making pretty good time, aren't we?"

Baku answered with a low, throaty sound, a click of her hunter's beak in agreement. Though she

relished the freedom of the sky, she wanted no more of its furnace heat in the coming day than he did.

When they made the line camp, she would willingly enter its heat-dispelling cavern.

Rain, the stallion, trotted on. He was accustomed now to transporting Baku, having fitted into the

animal pattern from off-world with his own contribution, speed and stamina in travel. Now he neighed

shrilly. But Hosteen had already caught sight of familiar landmarks. Top that small rise, pass through a

copse of muff bushes, and they were at the camp where Logan should be on duty for this ten-day period.

But somehow Hosteen was already doubting he would find him there.

The camp was not a building but a cave of sorts in the side of a hillock. Following the example of

native inhabitants, the settlers who ran frawns or horses in the plains set their hot-weather stations deep in

the cool earth. The conditioners, which controlled atmosphere for the buildings in the two small cities, the

structures in the small, widely separated towns of the range country, and main houses of the holdings, were

too complicated and expensive to be used in line camps.

"Halloooo" Hosteen raised his voice in the ringing hail of a camp visitor. The recessed earth-encircled

doorway of the living quarters was dark. From this distance he could not tell whether it was open or closed.

And the wider opening to the stable, which would give the imported horses a measure of protection, was

also a blank.

But a minute later a red-yellow figure moved against the red-yellow earth at the side of the mound,

and sun glinted brightly on two curves of ivory-white, breaking the natural camouflage of the waiting Norbie

by revealing the six-inch horns, as normal to his domed skull as thick black hair was to Hosteen's. A long

arm flashed up, and the rider recognized Gorgol, once hunter of the Shosonna tribe and now in charge of

the small horse herd that was Hosteen's own personal investment in the future.

The Norbie came out of the shade of the hillock to reach for Rain's hackamore as Hosteen swung

stiffly down. Brown Terran fingers flashed in fluid sign talk:

"You are here—there is trouble? Logan—?"

Gorgol was young, hardly out of boyhood, but he had already reached his full growth of limb. His

six-foot, ten-inch body, all lean, taut muscle over hard, compact bone, towered over Hosteen. His yellow

eyes, the vertical pupils mere threads of black against the sun's intrusive glare, did not quite meet those of

the Terran, but his right hand sketched a sign for the necessity of talk.

Norbie and human vocal cords were so dissimilar as to render oral speech between off-worlder and

native impossible. But the finger talk worked well between the races. An expert, as most of the range

riders had to be, could express complex ideas in small, sometimes nearly invisible movements of thumb and

fingers.

Hosteen went into the cave camp, Baku riding his shoulder. And while the coolness of the earth wall

could only be a few degrees less than the temperature of the outside, that difference was enough to bring a

sigh of content from the sweating man, a cluck of appreciation from the eagle.

The Terran halted inside to allow his eyes to adjust to the welcome dusk. And a single glance about

told him he had guessed right. If Logan had been here, he was now gone, and not just for the early-morning

duty inspection of the frawn herd. All four wall bunks were bare of sleeping rolls, there was no sign the

cook unit had been used that day, and the general litter of a rider, his saddle, tote bag, and canteen, were

absent.

But there was something else, a yoris hide bag, its glittering scaled exterior adorned by a feather

embroidery pattern that repeated over and over the conventionalized figure of a Zamle, the flying totem of

Gorgol's clan. That was the Norbie's traveling equipment—which by every right should have been stowed

in a bunk locker at the Center House fifty miles downriver.

Hosteen stretched out his arm to afford Baku a bridge to the perch hammered in the wall. Then he

went to the heating unit, measured out a portion of powdered "swankee," the coffee of the Arzor ranges,

and dialed the pot to three-minute service. He heard the faintest whisper behind and knew that Gorgol had

deliberately trodden so as to attract his attention. But he was determined to make the other give an

explanation without asking any questions himself, and he knew that it was unwise to push.

While the heating unit was at work, Hosteen sailed his hat to the nearest bunk, loosened the throat

lacings of his undyed frawn fabric shirt, and pulled it off before he sought the fresher and allowed water

vapor to curl pleasantly and coolly about his bare chest and shoulders.

As the Terran came out of the alcove, Gorgol snapped the first swankee container out of the unit,

hesitated, and drew a second, which he turned around and around in his hands, staring blank-eyed down at

the liquid as if he had never seen its like before.

Hosteen seated himself on the edge of a bunk, cradled the swankee cup in his hand, and waited

another long moment. Then Gorgol smacked his container down on the table top with a violence close to

anger, and his fingers flew, but not with such speed that Hosteen was unable to read the signs.

"I go—there is a call for all Shosonna—Krotag summons—"

Hosteen sipped the slightly bitter but refreshing brew, his mind working faster than his deliberate

movements might indicate. Why would the chief of Gorgol's clan be summoning those engaged in profitable

riders' jobs? The Big Dry was neither the season for hunting nor for war—both of which pursuits, dear to

the tradition and customs of the Norbies, were conducted only in the fringe months of the Wet Time. In the

Big Dry, it was rigid custom for the tribes and clans to split into much smaller family groups, each to resort

to one of the jealously guarded water holes to wait out the heat as best they could.

All tribes with any settler contacts strove to hire out as many of their men as riders as they could,

thus removing hungry and thirsty mouths from clan supply points. To summon in men in the Big Dry was a

policy so threatened with disaster as to appear insane. It meant trouble somewhere—bad trouble—and

something that had developed in the week of Storm's own absence.

Hosteen had ridden out of the Quade Peak Holding eight days ago—to set up his square stakes and

make his claim map before recording it at Galwadi. As a veteran of the forces and a Terran, he was able to

file on twenty squares, and he had set out his stakes around a good piece of territory to the northeast,

having river frontage and extending into the mountain foothills. There had been no whisper of trouble then,

nor had he seen any signs of movement of tribes in the outback. Though, come to think of it, he had not

crossed a Norbie trail or met any hunters either. That he had laid to the Big Dry. Now he wondered if more

than the rigors of Arzoran seasons had wrung the natives out of the country.

"Krotag summons—in the Big Dry!" Even in finger movements one could insert a measure of

incredulity.

Gorgol shifted from one yoris-hide booted foot to the other. His discomfort was plain to one who had

ridden with him for months. "There is medicine talk—" His fingers shaped that and then were stiffly

straight.

Hosteen sipped, his mind working fast and hard, fitting one small hint to another. "Medicine

talk"—was that answer to shut off more questions or could it be the truth? In any event, it stopped him

now. You did not —ever—inquire into "medicine," and his own Amerindian background made him accept

that prohibition as a thing necessary and right.

"How long?"

But Gorgol's straight fingers did not immediately reply. "Not to know—" came reluctantly at last.

Hosteen was still searching for a question that was proper and yet would give him a small scrap of

information when there was a clear note from the other end of the cave room, the alerting call of the com,

which tied each line camp to the headquarters of the holding. The Terran went to the board, thumbing down

the receive button. What came was no new message but a recall broadcast to be repeated mechanically at

intervals, set to bring in all riders. There was something going on!

"You ride then for the hills?" he signed to Gorgol.

The Norbie was at the doorway, shouldering his travel bag. Now he paused, and not only the change

of his expression showed his troubled mind. It was evident in every movement of his body. Hosteen

believed the native was obeying an imperative order, greatly against his own will.

"I ride. All Norbies ride now."

All Norbies, not just Gorgol. Hosteen digested that and, in spite of himself, vented his surprise in a

startled hiss. Quade depended heavily on native riders, not only here at the Peak Holding, but also down at

his wider spread in the Basin. And Quade was not the only range man who had a predominance of Norbie

employees. If they all took to the hills—! Yes, such an exodus could cripple some of the holdings.

"All Norbies—this, too, is medicine?"

But why? Medicine was clan business as far as Hosteen had been able to learn. He had never heard

of a whole tribe or nation combining their medicine meetings and ceremonies—certainly not in the season of

the Big Dry. Why, the river lands could not support such a gathering at this time of the year—let alone the

arid mountain country.

But Gorgol was answering. "Yes—all Norbies."

"Also the wild ones?"

"The wild ones—yes."

Impossible! There were tribal feuds nursed for the honor of fighting men. To send in the peace pole

for a clan, or perhaps—stretching it far—several clans at a time, was one thing. But for the Shosonna and

the Nitra to sit under such a pole with their war arrows still in the quivers—that was unheard of!

"I go—" Gorgol slapped his travel bag. "The horses, they are in the big corral—you will find them

safe." "You go—but you will return to ride again?" Hosteen was bothered by the suggestion of finality in the

other's signs.

"That lies with the lightning—"

The Norbie was gone. Hosteen walked back across the room to lie down on a bunk. So Gorgol was

not even sure he would be back. What did he mean about that lying with the lightning? The Norbies

recognized divine power in shadow beings who drummed thunder and used the lightning to slay. The

reputed home of these God Ones was the high mountains of the northeast. And those same mountains also

hid the caverns and passages of that mysterious unknown race who had either explored or settled here on

Arzor centuries before the Terran exploration ships had reached this part of the galaxy.

Hosteen, Logan, and Gorgol, together with Surra, the dune cat, and Hing, the meercat of the Beast

Team, had discovered the Cavern of the Hundred Gardens, a fabulous botanical preserve of the Sealed

Caves. That, and the ruined city of fortification in the valley beyond, was still under scientific study. It was

easy to believe that there were other Sealed Caves in the hills—and also easy to understand that the

Norbies had made gods of the long-vanished and still-unknown space travelers who had hollowed out the

Peaks to hold their mysteries.

Hosteen could spend hours speculating about that and not turn up one real fact. Now it was better to

sleep through the day heat and ride out at night to answer the return order from the holding. For all Hosteen

knew, that summons might have been sounding for days, which could account for Logan's absence. He

turned on his side and willed himself to sleep.

That mental alarm clock that had been conditioned into him during his service days brought him

awake hours later. To come out of the cave into the dusk of evening was walking into a wall of heavy heat,

but it was not as bad as sunlight. He allowed Rain to splash in the shallows of the river before he swung up

to the riding pad. Baku's world was not that of the night, but she accepted it at his urging, climbing into the

star-encrusted sky.

The Center House was three nights' ride from the line camp. And two of the days in between

Hosteen had to spend in improvised shelters, lying flat on the earth to get what coolness the parched soil

might provide. Shortly before midnight on the third night, he rode up to the blazing light of his goal. The

unusual glare of atom lamps was another warning of emergency.

"Who's there?" The suspicion-sharp hail out of the gate shadows made the Terran draw rein. Then

from his right a furry body materialized beside the snorting stallion, reared on its haunches, and drew a paw

with sheathed claws along Hosteen's boot.

"Storm," he answered the challenger and dismounted to caress Surra. The rasp of the dune cat's

tongue on his hand was an unusually fervid greeting, which awoke answering warmth within him.

"I'll take your horse." The man who came from the gate carried an unholstered stunner. "Quade's

been waiting', hopin' you'd make it soon—"

Hosteen muttered a brief thanks, more intersted in the fact that there were other men in the

courtyard. But there were no Norbies, not a single one of the native riders he was used to seeing there.

Gorgol had been right; the Norbies had all pulled out.

With Surra rubbing against his thigh, now and then butting him playfully with her head, he went to the

door of the big house. Tension was alive in the cat, too. She had sometimes been like this on the eve of one

of their wartime forays. Trouble excited but did not worry Surra.

"—continent-wide as far as reports have come in—"

Maybe Surra was exhilarated by the present happenings, but the tone of that voice told Hosteen that

Brad Quade was frankly worried.

CHAPTER TWO

Within the house, Hosteen found himself fronting a distinguished gathering that included most of the

settlers in the Peak country—even Rig Dumaroy, whose usual association with Brad Quade was one of

uneasy neutrality. But, of course, in any Norbie trouble Dumaroy would be present. He was the one large

holder in the frontier country who was prejudiced against the Arzoran natives and refused to hire any of

them. "It's Storm—" Dort Lancin, who had ridden in with the Terran on the military transport almost a year

ago, waved two fingers in greeting, a sign that was also a hunter signal for watchfulness.

The tall man standing by the com board glanced over his shoulder, and Hosteen read a shadow of

relief on his stepfather's face.

Dort Lancin, his older and more taciturn brother Artur, Dumaroy, Jotter Hyke, Val Palasco, Connar

Jaffe, Sim Starle—but no Logan Quade. Hosteen stood inside the doorway, his hand resting on Surra's head

as the big cat nuzzled against bis legs.

"What's going on?" he asked.

Dumaroy, a wide and rather vindictive grin on his face, answered first.

"All your pet goats have lit out for the hills. Always said they'd cross you up, always said it—now you

see. And I say"—his grin faded, and he brought his big hand down on his knee in a resounding

slap—"there's trouble brewing up there. The sooner we fort up and send for the Patrol to come in and settle

this once and for all—"

Artur Lancin's level voice, threaded with weariness, cut across the other's bellow with the neatness

of a belt knife slicing through frawn fat. "Yes, you've been broadcastin' on that beam all night, Dumaroy.

We received you loud and clear the first time. Storm," he addressed the younger man, "you see anything

different out in the hills?"

Storm flipped his hat up on the daryork horn rack and unfastened the belt that supported his stunner

and bush knife as he replied.

"I think now what I did not see is important."

"That being?" Brad Quade was pulling a fresh swankee container from the unit. He brought it over

and then, with a fingertip touch on Hosteen's shoulder, guided him to. a foam chair.

"No hunters—no trails—nothing." Hosteen sipped the restoring liquid between words. He had not

realized how bone-aching tired he was until he sat down. "I might have been riding in an empty world—"

The two Lancins watched him narrowly, and Dort nodded. He had hunted with the Norbies, was

welcome in their villages, and well understood the strangeness of an empty country.

"How far did you go?" Quade asked.

"I made the rounds to set up markers," Hosteen brought his claim map from the inner pocket of his

shirt. Quade took the sheet from him and compared its lines with the country survey chart that was a mural

for one wall of the room.

"Clean up to the gorge, eh?" Jaffe commented. "And no hunter sign?"

"No. I thought it was because of the Big Dry retreat—"

"That wouldn't come quite this early," Quade replied. "Gorgol brought in your cavvy of mounts four

days ago, took his bag, and rode off."

"I met him at the line camp."

"What did he tell you?"

"That there was a clan summons out—some sort of inter-tribal gathering—"

"Durin' the Big Dry?" demanded Hyke incredulously.

"I told you!" Dumaroy pounded with his fist this time, and Hosteen heard a snarling rumble from

Surra. He sent a mental command to silence the cat. "I told you! We're sittin' right here on the only free

runnin' water that keeps on runnin' through the worst of the Dry. And those goats are gonna come down

and try to butt us out of it! If we've the sense of water rats, we'll go up and clean 'em out before they can

get organized—"

"Once before you moved up to clean out Norbies," Quade said coldly. "And what did we find

out—that the Norbies weren't responsible for anything that had happened—that there was an Xik holdout

group behind all our stock losses!"

"Yeah—and is this another Xik trick? Callin' in all the tribes now?" Dumaroy's hostility was like a fog

spreading from him toward the other man.

"Maybe not Xik this time," Quade conceded. "But I refuse to make any move until I know more about

the situation. All we are sure of at present is that our Norbie riders have quit and are heading for the

mountains at a time when they are usually eager to work, and that this has not happened before."

Artur Lancin stood up. "That's sense, Dumaroy. We aren't goin' to stick our heads into some yoris'

mouth just on your say-so. I say we do a little scoutin'. Meanwhile, we rustle up riders from the Basin or

even pick up some drifters from the Port to tide us over. With the Dry on, the herds aren't goin' to move too

far from the river, and we'll need only a yoris patrol and some count work. My granddad got through, ridin'

on his own, with just his two boys to back him in the First Ship days. None of you here look too soft for the

saddle now."

"That's right," Sim Starle agreed. "We'll keep our coms on a circle hookup and with the alert on.

Anybody learns anything, he sends the word out on the beam. I'm for sittin' quiet until we're sure about

what's happenin' and why. Maybe these Norbies are havin' them a medicine powwow—and that's none of

our danged business!"

Hosteen, sinking deeper into his fog of weariness, watched the settlers leave for their 'copters, to fly

back to the scattered holdings of the Peak country. He was still too torpid to move when Brad Quade

re-entered, having seen off the company. But he roused himself to ask the one question bothering him most.

"Where's Logan?"

"Gone—"

The tone of the other's voice pulled Hosteen out of his lethargy of fatigue. "Gone! Where?"

"To Krotag's camp—at least that's what I think—"

Hosteen was on his feet now. "The young fool! This is medicine business, Gorgol said so—"

Brad Quale turned. His face might seem impassive to an outsider, but it did not hide his feelings from

Hosteen. "I know. But he has drunk blood with Kavok, Krotag's first son. That makes him a clansman—"

Hosteen bit back his protest. "Medicine" was tricky. A man could be an adopted clansman, living in

blood brotherhood with a Norbie, but that might not cover prying into the inner beliefs of the natives. There

was no use putting his thoughts and fears into words. Brad Quade knew all that and more.

"I can make it back up to the washes. How much of a start has he?"

"No. This was his choice; he took it with his eyes open. You won't ride after him. Tomorrow, if you

will, I want you on the way to Galwadi in the 'copter."

"Galwadi!"

Brad Quade picked up the claim map. "You have this to record, remember? Then—have a talk with

Kelson. He knows Logan." Quade ran one hand through his thick black cap of wiry hair. "I wish Kelson

had got that bill through the Council-—Logan was so keen on that Ranger business they talked about. If

that had gone through, maybe he'd have had a job he'd really settle down to. But you can't make the

Council hump just the way you want them to—even when you prod. Anyway—you see Kelson and try to

get a line on what's happening. There may have been an official clamp on Norbie news—I suspect that.

And I'd better stay here for now. Dumaroy's just hotheaded enough to try one of those dangerous schemes

of his if there's no one to talk him down—and just one incident might set off big trouble."

"What do you think is happening?"

Brad Quade hooked his thumbs in his wide rider's belt and stared at the floor as if he had never seen

such a pattern of river stones before. "I have no idea. This is 'medicine' right enough—but it's unique at this

time of the year. The Quades were First Ship people. I've found nothing in our family records like this—"

"Gorgol told me the peace poles were up for the wild tribes."

His stepfather nodded. "I know; he told me, too. But just to sit and wait—"

Hosteen made one of his rare gestures of feeling toward this man he had once sworn to kill, resting a

brown hand on the other's wide shoulder.

"To wait is always the hardest. Tomorrow night I will go to Galwadi. Logan—he is Norbie under the

skin, and he has drunk blood with the Zamle Shosonna. That is a sacred thing—big medicine—"

Brad Quade's hand came up to cover Hosteen's for a moment of shared warmth. "Big enough—we

can hope that. Now, you look like a two-day marcher in the flats. Get to bed and rest!"

To wait—Hosteen felt the first pinch of his own private kind of waiting as he sat in the 'copter boring

through the night sky on the way to Galwadi Behind him he left everything that counted on Arzor—a

soft-furred, keen-eyed cat with a coat of yellow and a brain that perhaps matched his own in intelligence,

though that intelligence might be of a different order, a horse he had trained, Hing, the meercat, a small,

tumbling clownish animal that had waddled four half-grown kits out for his inspection earlier that very

evening, Baku, perched on the top corral bar, bidding him farewell with a falcon scream. And a man, a man

whom he had once respected even while he hated him and whom he would now follow anywhere, anytime,

and for any purpose. He left all those in what might be the heart of enemy territory if their forebodings

crystallized into the worst of futures.

To all outward seeming, there was no tension in Galwadi. Hosteen, coming from the land registration

office, eyed the traffic on the street speculatively. The hour was far from dusk, and the small city, which

had been dead in the day's heat, was alive now, the streets and shops busy. But whether he could hire any

riders here was another question. To get new light-and-tie men at this season was a problem. There were

several gather-ins in the lower town, and those would be a starting place for his quest. But first—dinner.

He chose a small, quiet eating place and was surprised at the wide array of dish dials he was offered.

Food on the holdings was usually plentiful but plain, with little variety. The few off-world luxury items were

carefully saved for holidays. But here he was fronted with a choice such as was more usual in a Port city

catering to off-world visitors. Then he noted a Zacathan in the next booth and realized that a restaurant in

the capital needs must satisfy the alien government representatives as well as the settlers.

Deciding to plunge, Hosteen dialed three dishes he had not tasted since his last service leave. He was

sipping at a tube planted in a dalee bulb when someone paused by his table, and he glanced up to see

Kelson, the Peace Officer of the Peak section.

"Heard you were looking for me, Storm."

"Tried your office com," Hosteen assented. He was a little at a loss as to how to word his question.

Should he just bluntly ask what was up—if there was any news being withheld from the holdings? But

Kelson continued.

"Coincidence. I was trying to reach you. Called the Peaks—Quade said you were here registering

your squares. You've decided to settle in the Peak country then?"

"Yes—horse breeding with Put Larkin. He's off-world now. Heard of a new crossbreed on

Astra—Terran blood interbred with the local species of duicorn. Can stand up to desert heat there—or so

the breeder claims!"

"So they might do for the Big Dry here, eh? It's a thought. But your range isn't open yet—"

What did that matter, Hosteen wondered. No one would start on holding work until the rains came.

But Kelson was beckoning to someone across the room.

"There's a problem—maybe you can help us," the Peace Officer continued. "Mind if we join you?

Time's essential in this one—"

The man who came up was an off-worlder of a type usually not seen on a frontier world. His sleek

form-fitting tunic, picked out with a silver-thread pattern, and the long hose-breeches of flat black were

those of a business executive on one of the densely populated merchant worlds, and fashionable though

they might have been on his home planet, they were as incongruous here as they were ill-becoming to his

pudgy figure. Ridiculous as he might look in this Arzoran restaurant, one did not think him a figure of fun

when one observed his craggy face, saw the square set of a determined and forceful chin and the bleak

eyes that were those of a man used to giving orders. Hosteen recognized the breed and stiffened—it was

one with which he had little sympathy.

"Gentle Homo Lass Widders, Beast Master Storm." Kelson made the introductions, using the title of

respect from the inner planets for the stranger, who seated himself without invitation across the table from

Hosteen and proceeded to survey the Terran with an appraisal the other found insolent.

"I am not of the forces now." Hosteen corrected Kelson perversely. "So it is not Beast

Master—today I light and tie for Quade."

"You're a holding head rather since an hour ago, aren't you? You've located your stakes. Have you

set up a brand?" Kelson asked.

"Arrowhead S," Storm replied absently. "And what do you wish of a mustered-out Beast Master,

Gentle Homo?"

"About a month, maybe more, of your time and services," Widders rapped out in the clicking Galactic

basic of the business worlds. "I want to have you—and your team—guide me into the Blue section—"

Hosteen blinked and looked to Kelson for confirmation that he had really heard that idiotic statement.

To his surprise, the expression on the Peace Officer's face read that this stranger from one of the hothouse

worlds meant exactly what he said.

"It is a matter of time, Beast Master. I understand we must get into that country within the next two

weeks if we go at all before next season."

Hosteen did not blink this time. He merely replied with the truth.

"Impossible."

"Nothing," returned Widders with his irritating confidence, "is impossible, given the right man and

credits enough. Kelson believes you are the man, and I can provide the credits."

There was no use giving this madman a blanket denial; he would not accept that. Listen to his story,

get the reason behind this insane plan, then prove to him its utter folly—that was the only way to proceed.

"Why the Blue?" Hosteen asked as he spooned up some lorg sauce and spread it neatly over a horva

fritter."Because my son's there—"

Again Hosteen glanced at Kelson. The Blue was unknown. Those mountains, which were its western

ramparts, were known, and appeared on the maps of the Peak country. But what lay behind that barrier

existed only as a series of hazy aerial photos. The treacherous air currents of those heights had kept out

'copter surveys, and the territory was the hunting ground of the feared wild Norbie cannibals, hated,

shunned, and fought by their own kind for generations. No one—government man, settler, yoris

hunter—had ever gone into the Blue and returned. It was posted off limits by government order. Yet here

was Kelson listening to a proposal to invade the forbidden section as if Widders was doing no more than

suggesting a stroll down a Galwadi street. Again Hosteen waited for enlightenment.

"You're a veteran of Confed forces, Storm. Well, my son is, too. He served with a Breakaway Task

Force—"

Hosteen was a little jarred. To find an inner planet man among the Breakaways—those tough, very

tough, first-in fighters—was unusual.

"He was wounded, badly, just before the Xik collapse. Since then he has been on Allpeace—"

Allpeace, one of the rehabilitations worlds where men were rebuilt from human wreckage to live

passably normal lives again. But if young Widders had been on Allpeace, how had he gotten into the Blue

on Arzor?

"Eight months ago a transport left Allpeace with a hundred discharged veterans on board, Iton among

them. On the fringe of this system, that ship hit a derelict hyper bomb." Widders might have been discussing

the weather if you did not watch his eyes and note that small twitch of lip he could not control.

"Just a month ago a lifeboat from that ship was discovered on Mayho, this planet's sister world. There

were two survivors. They reported that at least one more LB left the transport, and they cruised with her

into this system. Their boat was damaged, and they had to set down on Mayho. Their companion headed on

here to Arzor, promising to send back help—"

"And didn't arrive," Hosteen stated instead of questioned.

But Kelson was shaking his head. "No—there is a chance she did arrive, that she crashed in the

Blue. Weak signals of some sort were recorded on robot coms in two different line camps out in the Peaks.

A cross check gives us a Blue landing point."

"And your local climate would mean death to any survivors out there without adequate supplies or

transportation at this season," Widders continued. "I want you to guide me in—to get my son out—"

If he was on that LB and is still alive, Hosteen added silently. But he made his oral reply as plain as

he could.

"You are asking the impossible, Gentle Homo. To go into the Blue at this time is simply suicide, and

there is no possible way of getting behind the Peaks during the Big Dry."

"Natives live there all year around, don't they?" Widders' voice scaled up a note or two.

"Yes, the Norbies live there. But their knowledge of the country is not shared with us."

"You can hire native guides, anything you need. There is no limit on funds—"

"Credits can't buy water knowledge from a Norbie. And there is also this—right now the tribes are

making medicine in the Peak country. We would not be able to ride in under those conditions even in the

Wet Time when all the odds are in our favor."

"I've heard about that," Kelson said. "It has to be looked into—"

"Not by me!" Hosteen shook his head. "There's trouble shaping up back there. I'm down here partly

to report it and to try and hire riders to replace our Norbies. Every native has pulled out of the Peak country

during the past week—every one—"

Kelson did not appear surprised. "So we heard. And they are moving northeast."

"Into the Blue." Hosteen digested that.

"Just so. You were a short way into that country when you discovered that Xik nest. And

Logan—he's hunted along there. You're the only two settlers who have any ground-level information we

can use," Kelson added.

"No." Hosteen tried to make that negative sound final. "I'm not completely crazy. Sorry, Gentle

Homo, the Blue is closed country—in more ways than one."

Widders' eyes were no longer bleak. There was a spark of anger in their gray depths. "If I refuse to

accept that?"

Hosteen slipped a credit disk into the table slot. "That is your privilege, Gentle Homo, and none of my

business. See you later, Kelson." He rose and walked away from Widders and his problems. He had his

own to deal with now.

CHAPTER THREE

"That's it—" For some reason Storm could not sit still but strode up and down the length of the big

main room of the holding while he gave the results of his mission to Galwadi. "I hired just one rider, and I

had to bail him out of Confinement—"

"What had he done?" Brad Quade asked.

"Tried to wipe off the pavement of a street, using the aeropilot of the Valodian minister for a mop.

The minister was rather upset about it—his protests got Havers twenty days or forty credits. He'd lost his

last credit at Star and Comet, so he was sweating out the twenty days. Had served three of them when I

paid his fine. He seems to know his business, though."

"And you saw Kelson?"

"Kelson saw me. He's blown all his rockets and is spinning in for a big smash if you ask me."

Unconsciously Storm dropped into the old service slang.

There was a soft growl from the shadows, where Surra picked up his mood of irritation and faint

apprehension, translating it into her own form of protest.

"What did he say?"

"He had an inner-planet civ in tow. They wanted a guide into the Blue—right now!'

"What?" Quade's incredulity was as great as Hosteen's own had been back in Galwadi.

Swiftly he outlined Widders' story.

"That could all be true, though why he's so sure his son was on board that LB—wish-thinking, I

suppose." Quade shook his head. "A Norbie might just make it. Only you're not going to find a Norbie who

will try, not now. On the other hand—" Quade's voice trailed off. He was sitting quietly at his file desk, two

of Hing's kits curled up in his lap, a third cuddled down on his shoulder. Now he looked to the map on the

wall. "On the other hand, that might be just the direction in which we should do some prospecting."

"Why?"

"Dort Lancin made a swing up the valley in his 'copter. He spotted two clans on the march, and they

weren't just shifting camp. They were moving with a purpose—so fast they had left a stray mare—"

Storm stopped pacing, eying his stepfather with startled interest. For a Norbie to abandon a horse

under any circumstances, except to save life, was so unheard of as to join in magnitude Widders' desire to

enter the Blue.

"Heading northeast?" He was not the least surprised to be answered by a nod.

"I can't understand it. That's worse than Nitra country—that's where they eat THE MEAT." He

made the Arzoran sign for the cannibal tribes. "No Shosonna or Warpt or Fanga would head in that

direction. He'd be ritually unclean for years—"

"Just so. But that's where they're going—not raiding parties but the clans, with their women and

children. So I agree this much with Kelson—we ought to know what is going on back there. But how any

of us could get in—that is a different matter."

Storm went to the map. " 'Copter would crack up if those wind currents are all they're reported to

be." "They are, all right," Quade returned with grim emphasis. "You might—with a crack pilot—do some

exploring along the fringe, under the right conditions and weather. But you couldn't make any long survey

flight into that region. Any exploring party would have to go on horses or afoot."

"The Norbies do have wells—"

"Which are clan secrets and not shared with us."

Storm was still tracing the lines of the mountains on the mural map. "Did Logan ever learn any well

calls?"Though the human voice box could not duplicate Norbie speech, nor a Norbie produce anything like a

Galactic basic word, there was a rarer form of communication that some of the Arzor-born settlers—those

initiated deeply enough into native ways—could understand, even if they could not imitate it themselves.

Long, lilting calls, which were almost like songs, were a known code. These were used by native scouts as

warnings or reports, and it was common knowledge among the riders that some were used only to signal

the appearance or disappearance of water.

"He might have."

"You're sure he is riding with Krotag?"

"He wouldn't be allowed to join any other clan."

The meercats awoke, squeaked. Again Surra growled, alert to the tension behind that quiet answer.

Then the big cat padded soft-footed to the door.

"Someone's coming—" Storm stated the obvious. Surra was familiar with every living thing at the

holding, human, animal, Norbie. She was waiting now for a stranger.

The dune cat's phenomenal hearing and her better than human nose had heralded the newcomers

long before they reached the door, where Quade now stood in the cool gloom of very early morning to

welcome them. A path of light from the window picked out the green tunic of a Peace Officer, and a

moment later the visitor's hail came in Kelson's voice.

"Hallo—the holding!"

"The fire is waiting!" Brad Quade called back the customary answer.

Storm was not in the least surprised to see that Kelson's companion was Widders, who, in his finicky

civ dress, looked even more out place in the comfortable but rather rough-hewn main chamber. Its chief

decorations were trophies of Norbie weapons on the walls, its heavy furnishings were made out of native

wood by settler hands, and a few off-world mementos of Brad Quade's roving past as an officer of Survey

were scattered around.

Widders crossed the threshold with an authoritative stride and then halted quickly as he fronted Surra.

The big cat regarded him with a long, wide-eyed stare. Storm knew that she had not only imprinted the civ's

appearance on her memory for all time but had also made up her mind concerning him, and that her opinion

was not in any way flattering to the off-world Gentle Homo. Majestically, she moved to the far side of the

room and leaped to the low couch, which was her own particular seat. But she did not curl up at ease;

instead she sat upright, the nervous tip of her fluffy fox tail just brushing her foretoes, her vulpine ears at

attention.

Storm busied himself at the heating unit to produce the inevitable cups of swankee. His early tension

was increased now. Kelson had brought Widders here. That meant that neither the off-worlder nor the

officer had given up the wild scheme about the Blue, but Quade's word would carry weight. Hosteen did

not believe that the others were going to be satisfied with the outcome of the interview.

"Glad you came," Quade said to Kelson. "We've a problem here—"

"I have a problem, Gentle Homo," Widders cut in. "I understand you have a son who knows the

outback regions very well, has hunted over them. I'd like to see him—as soon as possible—"

Quade's face showed no signs of a frown, but just as Hosteen knew Surra's emotions, he was aware

of the flick of temper that brash beginning aroused in Brad Quade.

"I have two sons," the settler replied deliberately, "both of whom can claim a rather extensive

knowledge of the Peaks. Hosteen has already told me of your wish to enter the Blue."

"And he has refused to try it." Widders was smoldering under bis shell. He was not a man used to, or

able to accept, opposition.

"If he had agreed, he would need remedial attention from a conditioner," Quade returned dryly.

"Kelson, you know the utter folly of such a plan."

The Peace Officer was staring into the container of swankee he held. "Yes, I know all the risks,

Brad. But we have to get in there—it's imperative! And chiefs such as Krotag will accept a mission like

this as an excuse—they can understand a father in search of his son."

So that was it—a big piece of puzzle slipped neatly into place. Hosteen began to realize that Kelson

was making sense after all. There was a reason for exploring the Blue, an imperative reason. And Widders'

quest would be understandable to the Norbies, among whom family and clan ties were close. A father in

search of his missing son—yes, that could be a talking point, which normally would gain Widders native

guides, mounts, maybe even the use of some of the hidden water sources. But the important word in that

was "normally." This was not a normal Big Dry, and the clans were acting very abnormally.

"Logan has blood drink-brothers or a brother with Krotag's clan, hasn't he?" Kelson pushed on. "And

you"—he looked to Hosteen—"are a hunt and war companion of Gorgol."

"Gorgol's gone."

"And so has Logan," Quade added. "He rode off five days ago to join Krotag's drift—"

"Into the Blue!" Kelson exclaimed.

"I don't know."

"The Zamle clan were in the First Finger." Kelson put down his drink and went to the wall map.

"They were in camp here last time I checked." He stabbed a forefinger on one of the long, narrow canyons

striking up into the Peaks, almost a roadway into the Blue.

Storm moved uneasily, picked up a wandering meercat kit, and held it cupped against his chest, where

it patted him with small forepaws and cluttered drowsily. Logan had gone with the clan. The reasons for

doing it might matter, but the fact that he had gone mattered more. The boy might be condemned by his

own recklessness, facing more than just the perils of the Big Dry.

Continuing to stare at the map without really seeing its configurations, Hosteen began to plan.

Rain—no, he could not ride Rain. The stallion was an off-world import without even one year's seasoning

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LORDOFTHUNDERByAndreNortonScannedbyBW-SciFiCopyright©,1962,byHarcourt,Brace&World,Inc.AnAceBook,byarrangementwithHarcourt,Brace&World,Inc.AllRightsReservedCHAPTERONERedridgesofmountains,rustedevenmorebythefirstserebreathoftheBigDry,cutacrossthelavenderskyofArzornorthandeast.Atanhourpastdawn,dehydrat...

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