DARK IS THE SUN

Jeydee spoke out of a mouth which had lost half its teeth. "Mother, tell them! We ca

Feersh stood in a corner, her hands tied behind her. She, top, was naked and no doubt very conscious of her ugly scrawny body and breasts, which sagged almost to her navel. The long narrow face with its bulging cheekbones and hairy upper lip was set as if it were a wax mask. The blind eyes stared straight ahead.

Sloosh said, "It is a waste of time to give pain to these creatures. You might enjoy this, Yawtl, but I don't. I'm very sensitive to the pain of others. I can permit torture, if there is a rational reason for it, even if I too suffer, though not of course to the same degree as the tortured.

"But my main objection is the uselessness of this. The witch isn't going to tell us anything which will keep her children from being hurt. She doesn't really care about them. She's spoiled them, kept them from maturing, not from love but because they'd be weak and easier to handle. Her eldest daughter has been raised somewhat more strictly because she will someday be the chief, and so she has a stronger character. However, Feersh isn't going to give in if you torture Jowanarr. In fact, she might even enjoy it.

"So, I suggest you tackle Feersh herself. Not with pain or threats. She's too tough for those. She—"

For the first time, the witch spoke. "What is the plant-man saying?"

Hoozisst raised his thick tangled eyebrows as if he thought they might be making progress. He translated for her.

She said, "What he says is true. You could kill me, and I still wouldn't cry out, let done tell you what you want to know. However, I wouldn't hesitate at all telling you where the eggs are hidden if I believed you'd not kill me. If I could think of some way to guarantee that we'd be freed once I told you, I'd do it."

Kiyt cried out, "Mother! Why didn't you say this before? Why let us be degraded and beaten?"

The witch smiled, revealing very yellow teeth. "I've been too soft with you. I thought that perhaps the ordeal might strengthen your character."

His face twisted with anger, Kiyt spat blood at her. Then he stepped back as if he feared that she might strike him.

Feersh either didn't know that he was the one spitting or she was ignoring him. She said, "Vegetablething, can't we make a deal? One which you can enforce? I don't trust these savages."

"Vegetable-thing!" Sloosh said. "You don't arrange such matters by starting with an insult!"

Hoozisst translated for Feersh.

She said, "I apologize—for the first time in my life. Actually, it wasn't an insult. I am a flesh-thing, and you are what I said. But since it offends you ... Now, what about my proposal?"

The Archkerri closed his eyes. Except for the coughing of a slave and the muted groaning of the two sons, there was silence. Finally, he opened his eyes. "It's a reasonable suggestion. I think we should accept."

"No!" Hoozisst shouted. "What about my revenge? Would you cheat me of that? We can have what is owing me and the eggs also!"

"Ah, but if revenge is in order," Sloosh said, "what about Vana's and Deyv's? You stole their eggs, and it was only with difficulty that I could keep them from torturing, and then killing you. The reason I could is that they needed you to help get the eggs back. The same logic applies here."

Hoozisst was too angry to talk for a while. Then he said, "But I was under duress! I had to steal the eggs or I wouldn't have gotten the Emerald of Anticipation! Also, she would have killed me if I hadn't done what she wanted!"

"She didn't tell you to rob me of my crystal," Sloosh said. "She didn't want that. Yet, you took it.

Besides, all you had to do was promise her you'd steal the eggs and then run away. She could never have found you."

"What? And be forever separated from my tribe?"

" 'Forever' is not exact. It would have lasted only until you died. However, you do have a point there.

Though it's not much."

The Yawtl, scowling, stomped around for a moment, taking time to knock Kiyt down with his fist. He started toward the witch, but Sloosh said, "No, Hoozisst."

"I smell a trick," the Yawtl said. "We'll give her our promise, and then we'll find out she'll tell us but we still won't have the eggs."

"A good point," Sloosh said. "Tell Feersh that we don't just want the location of the eggs. We must be able to get our hands on them. It's possible that she's set traps around them."

Feersh listened to the translation. She said, "You tell the plant-man that I agree to those terms. But first we must be unbound. I give my word that we won't attack you if you don't attack us."

"A witch's word!" Hoozisst said harshly.

"As good as a Yawtl's," she said.

"Which would mean no good at all," Vana said.

Hoozisst raised his fist and said, "Aargh!"

Aejip rose to her feet and snarled. The Yawtl lowered his fist and backed away.

"I wasn't going to hit you. I wouldn't be that stupid. But I'm furious!"

"It doesn't take eyes to see that," the witch said. "Now, tell the plant-man that I'll cooperate to the fullest, that I'll withhold nothing, so that you may get your eggs and his crystal back."

Deyv said, "You must also tell us why you wanted them."

"I'll be very happy to do that. In fact, if you hadn't attacked us, if you'd only gotten as far as the place beneath the tharakorm, I'd have told you why. I never dreamed that you'd have a plant-man in your group. One of the reasons I threw the Yawtl overboard was that he'd disobeyed me. I hadn't told him to steal an Archkerri's crystal. I had no use for one.

"But I never suspected that the plant-man would follow the Yawtl. If I had, I'd not have been so negligent. I'd have had sentinels. I knew that the cable-vines wouldn't give an alarm if a plant-man touched them. But who would have thought that one of those creatures would care if his crystal was stolen?"

Feersh also asked that she and her children be robed at once. It wasn't proper for them to appear before their slaves without clothing, except when these were in bed with them or bathing them, of course.

Sloosh said that that was all right with him. Hoozisst objected to any agreement. He still believed that the witch was somehow tricking them. The others overruled him.

Feersh, now clad in a robe covered with many strange figures and a few of The Dark Beast and wearing a tall blue cylindrical hat, said that she was ready to give them their information. But she wanted them to reaffirm that they would do nothing to her once they got it.

"That doesn't need repeating," Sloosh said.

Hoozisst groaned and said, "She must have a good-reason for making sure of thatl I tell you, she's playing us for fools!"

"I can't do anything that the goddesses haven't already done," she said.

She paused, licked dry lips, then spoke. "Very well. Your eggs and crystal are embedded inside one of the fungus growths at the base of a tree in the forest that rings the sandy plain around the place where the tharakorm were moored. In fact, from what you tell me, you camped by that tree."