The Source

Minutes later he began to breathe more easily, reached the crest and was at once bathed in warm, wan sunlight. Shielding his eyes against the sudden light, however hazy, he turned to look back. A quarter-mile away, the castle had merged once more into the face of the cliff. Jazz knew it was there for he'd seen it - had even felt it - but stone was stone and the uneven cliff face was a good disguise. And Jazz realized how glad he was to have come past that place unscathed. Maybe there was no one, or nothing, there after all. But still he was glad.

He took a deep breath, issued it in a long drawn-out sigh - and gave a massive start!

Something moved close by, in the shadow of fallen boulders where they humped darkly on his left, and a cold female voice, speaking Russian, said: 'Well, Karl Vyotsky, it's your choice. Talk or die. Right here and right now!'

Jazz's finger had been on the trigger of his SMG ever since the castle. Even before the woman's voice had started speaking, he'd turned and sprayed the darkness where she was hiding. She was dead now - or would be if the weapon had been cocked! Jazz was glad it wasn't. Sometimes, with his speed and accuracy, it was as well to take precautions. On this occasion his precaution had been to leave the gun safe. It was good practice for his nerves, that's all. Shooting at shadows was a sure sign that a man was cracking up.

'Lady,' he said, his voice tense, ' - Zek Foener? - I'm not Karl Vyotsky. If I was you'd probably be on your way to an alien heaven right now!'

Eyes peered at Jazz from the darkness, but not a woman's eyes. They were triangular - and yellow. And much too close to the ground. A wolf, grey, huge, hungry-looking, stepped cautiously into view. Its red tongue lolled between incisors nearly an inch and a half long. And now Jazz cocked his weapon. The action made a typical ch-ching sound.

'Hold it!' came the woman's voice again. 'He's my friend. And until now - maybe even now - the only friend I have.' There came a scuffing of stones and she stepped out of the shadows. The wolf went to heel on her right and a little to her rear. She had a gun like Jazz's, which shook in her hands where she pointed it at him.

'I'll say it again,' he said, 'just in case you weren't listening: I'm not Karl Vyotsky.' Her gun was still shaking, violently now. Jazz looked at it, said: 'Hell, you'd probably miss me anyway!'

'The man on the radio?' she said. 'Before Vyotsky? I ... I recognize your voice.'

'Eh?' Then Jazz understood. 'Oh, yes, that was me. I was trying to give Khuv a hard time - but I doubt if he could hear me. It was Khuv sent me through the Gate, just like he did it to you. Only he didn't lie to me about it. I'm Michael J. Simmons, a British agent. I don't know how you feel about that, but ... it looks like we're in the same boat. You can call me Jazz. All my friends do, and... would you mind not pointing that thing at me?'

She sobbed, a great racking gulp of a sob, and flew into his arms. He could feel her straining not to, but she had to. Her gun went clattering to the stony earth and her arms tightened round him. 'British?' she sobbed against his neck. 'I don't care if you're Japanese, African, or an Arab! As for my gun - it's jammed. It has been for days. And I'm out of bullets anyway. If it was working and I had the ammunition - I'd probably have shot myself long ago. I... I...'

'Easy,' said Jazz. 'Easy!'

'The Sunsiders are after me,' she continued to sob, 'to give me to the Wamphyri, and Vyotsky said there's a way back home, and -'

'He what?' Jazz held her close. 'You've spoken to Vyotsky? That's impos - ' And he checked himself. The ante

'Oh, God!' Her fingers were biting into his shoulders. 'Oh, God!'

Jazz tightened his grip on her, stroked her face, felt her tears hot in the crook of his neck. He smelled her, too, and it wasn't exactly flowers. It was sweat, and fear, and more than a little dirt, too. He pushed her away to arm's length and looked at her. Even in this deceptive light she looked good. A little haggard but good. And very human.

She couldn't know it, but he was just as desperately pleased to see her.

'Zek,' he said, 'maybe we should find ourselves a nice safe place where we can talk and exchange notes, eh? I think you can probably save me a hell of a lot of time and effort.'

'There's the cave where I rested,' she told him, a little breathlessly. 'It's about eight miles back. I was asleep when I heard your voice on my radio. I thought I was dreaming. By the time I realized I wasn't it was too late. You'd gone. So I headed for the sphere, which was where I was going anyway. And I kept calling every ten minutes or so. Then I got Vyotsky...' She gave a small shudder.

'OK,' Jazz quickly told her. 'It's all right now - or about as right as it can be. Tell me all about it on our way to this cave of yours, right?' He stooped to pick up her gun, and the great wolf went into a crouch, screwed its face into a ferocious mask and snarled a warning.

She patted the animal almost absently on its great head where its ears lay flat to the long skull, said: 'It's all right, Wolf - he's a friend.'

'Wolf?' Jazz couldn't help smiling, however tightly. 'That's original!'

'He was given to me by Lardis,' she said. 'Lardis is the leader of a Traveller pack. Sunsiders, of course. Wolf was to be my protection, and he has been. We got to be friends very quickly, but he's not much of a pet. There's too much of the wild in him. Think of him in a friendly way, like a big dog -1 mean really think of him that way, as your friend - and he won't be any trouble.' She turned and began to lead the way down from the crest toward the misty orb of the sun sitting apparently motionless over the southern mouth of the pass.

'Is that a theory or a fact?' Jazz asked her. 'About Wolf, I mean?'

'It's a fact,' she answered simply. Then, as quickly as she'd started off, she paused and grabbed his arm. 'Are you sure we can't get back through the sphere?' Her voice had a pleading quality.

'I told you,' Jazz answered, trying not to sound too harsh, 'Vyotsky's a liar - amongst a lot of other things. Do you think he'd still be here if he knew a way out? When they put me through the Gate I dragged Vyotsky with me. That's the only reason he's here. I figured if it was bad enough for me it was good enough for him! Khuv and Vyotsky, those people are ... it's hard to find a word for them without being offensive.'

'Be offensive,' she said, bitterly. 'They're bastards!'

'Tell me,' said Jazz, following her as she started off again, 'why were you heading for the sphere in the first place?'

She glanced at him briefly. 'When you've been here as long as I have you won't need to ask. I came in that way, and it's the only Gate I know. I keep dreaming about being able to get out that way. I wake up thinking it's changed, that the poles have reversed and the flow lies in the other direction. So I was going there to try it. At sunup, of course, which is now. One chance and only one, and if I didn't make it through, then I wouldn't be making it back to Sunside, either.'

Jazz frowned. 'Reversed poles and all that - is that scientific stuff? Is it supposed to mean something?'

She shook her head. 'Just my fantasy,' she said, 'but it was worth one last shot...'

They walked in silence for a while, with the great wolf loping between them. There were a million questions Jazz wanted to ask, but he didn't want to exhaust her. Eventually he said: 'Where the hell is everybody? Where are the animals, birds? I mean, it's nature's way that where there are trees there are animals to chew on them. Also, I saw things at Perchorsk that made me think my coming here would be like rolling a snowball into hell! And yet I haven't seen -'