Footfall

“But,” Takpusseh said. “Yes. She is not comely. Indeed, some would say she is misshapen. Yet I find her attractive enough, and as you say, she is diligent at her work.”

“It happens seldom that spaceborn mates to sleeper. Do you know that you are acceptable?”

“How should I? I have no one to speak for me. None save you—”

“Yamp,” Raztupisp-minz mused. “Her grandfather is Persantipyamp. He is said to be irascible. A warrior in his day.” And say no more; there was no war, bus had there been, it could only have been against the sleepers. “You wish me to speak with him.”

“I ask that, my leader.”

“Tashayamp.” Raztupisp-minz snorted wry mirth. “1 have little experience in this, I should ask you what to say! Our roles are indeed reversed, in all ways. Let me see if I recall the words I am to say—”

“1 know them,” Takpusseh admitted. “But let the customs be kept.” He listened as Raztupisp-minz stumbled through the traditional lecture: that the fithp mate for life, that mating is an alliance forever, not to be entered through passions.

“Are you certain it is not passion? It is Time for your herd—”

“Not mere passion,” Takpusseh said. “Recall, I am-somewhat-older than you. I was mated to your grandmother. I know something of passion, and of reason as well.”

“Yes. Politically, it is a good match. The yainp clan holds a wide domain; and you have taken your own.” And you are male, mating with a spaceborn female. It is not as there were the other way, spaceborn male to submit — “I will speak with Persantipyamp, and if he will consent, I will come with you to present the winter flowers.” Raztupisp-minz rose to his feet. “And my congratulations!”

25. THE GARDEN

The opinion of the strongest is always the best.

They had floated forward, then inward along half a mile of spiral corridor, not quite in free-fall, but with so little gravity that motion was difficult for the newcomers. Wes tried to help where he could.

Two alien warriors carried large boxes. Tashayamp led the way.

A huge door opened for them: a cargo door, much bigger than would be needed to pass a fi’. They entered.

This huge chamber must be along the axis of the ship, forward of the chamber of the Podo Thuktun. A line of yellow-white light ran down the middle, too bright to look at directly. Elsewhere there was green, everywhere green, with splashes of carmine and yellow. Alien plants grew in cages, rooted in thick wet pads fixed along the walls. Green ba

Here was a roughly rectangular block of loose dirt. Vines wrapped it loosely, and it was riddled with seven-inch holes. A head popped from a hole and was gone before Wes could react. A streamlined head, it had been, like a ferret’s, with red beads for eyes.

It was, finally, like being on another world.

Wes stole a glance at the others. Jeri Wilson was keeping her calm. Carrie Woodward expected to be killed at any moment. The prospect didn’t seem to frighten her much. Before she allowed herself to be escorted from the cell, she had led the others in prayer, and stared disapprovingly at Wes Dawson when he didn’t join in.

Melissa and Gary were gaping: not frightened, but delighted. Plants, birds, animals-and distant objects, after confinement in cells and corridors. Melissa pointed at something above them. It was gone before Wes could see it. but they all stopped to look.

Takpusseh looked back impatiently. “Come!” They followed hastily. Otherwise the warrior fithp would use their gun butts as prods, not brutally but playfully, as if they were herding children.

A tree grew along the ship’s axis, thirty feet tall. One continuous green leaf ran round it in a spiral. Guy wires along its trunk braced it against lateral acceleration.

Something dived at Wes’s head. He ducked as the warrior behind him casually brushed the thing aside with his mink. The thing flapped off shrilling a musical curse. A bird. They were everywhere: long-necked birds with large, colorful aft wings that turned up sharply at the tips, and small canards set to either side of the long neck. Wes gaped in wonder. “Is this your food source?” he asked.

“Ours and yours.” Takpusseh waved his trunk at a plot of bare dirt. It must have been recently cleared: dust and plant detritus floated in the air around it. The teacher said, “Now you have plants from your own world to grow here. Space has been set aside.”

John Woodward came forward to the boxes of soil. Gingerly he took a handful and rubbed it in his fingers. “Good Kansas soil,” he said. “Maybe we’ll live long enough for something to grow.”

“You will live,” Takpusseh said. He peered at the farmer. “Do you suffer for your distance from your home? One day you will land with us.”

Woodward didn’t answer. His eyes glittered.

“For now you will grow your own food,” Tashayamp said. “On the level trays, and in those.” She pointed to cages filled with earth. “There is a flower. This.” She held out a flower, bright, shaped like a long, thin trumpet. It was as large as a sunflower, with wild colors. Strange shapes lurked deep within the blossom.

She’s learned English fast, Wes thought. But her posture is— strange. Why? I wish I could read their body language.

“We have seeds,” she said. “You will grow this in soil from your world.”

“What if it won’t grow?” John Woodward demanded.

“It will grow. If need, we will mix soil from other world. It will grow.”

“And that’s important?” Wes asked.

“It may be,” she said. She glanced at Takpusseh. “You will begin now.”

“You will also grow to feed you.” Takpusseh took a seed packet from one of the boxes. It was tiny in his ropy digits. He peered at it, tore it open. Some of the seeds spilled. A warrior was prepared: he swept a fine-mesh net through the cloud. Takpusseh himself ignored the incident. “Farming is different when you float. Seed must be pushed in, so, with small tool… no, your digits are small enough. Water comes from below, from wall. Against forward wall’, find special tools. Sticks to hold plants against thrust. Tools to stir dirt.”

John and Carrie Woodward were examining the dirt plot. They began taking seeds out of the boxes. John said “Plants should grow taller here,” with a question in his voice.

The children moved warily away, their eyes wide with wonder. Something like a bird whizzed past.

“Not there,” Tashayamp called. She motioned the children back to the group. “You wait here: Do not disturb those—”

Aft, from the grove of spiral-wound trees, came the windinstrument murmur of fithp voices.

The Herdmaster had climbed a huge pillar plant. Like the humans themselves, in the minuscule gravity he had become a brachiator. He found the viewpoint odd, amusing. He watched.

In a forward corner of the Garden the human prisoners worked. The Herdmaster admired their agility, newly trained dirtyfeet that they were. They seemed docile enough as they planted alien seeds in alien soil. Yet the Breakers’ disturbing reports could not be ignored much longer. It was more than enough to make his head ache.

Yet here were smells to ease his mind: plants in bloom, and a melancholy whiff of funereal scent. The end of life for the Traveler Fithp was the funeral pit, and then the Garden. Twelve fithp warriors, wounded on Winterhome, had gone to the funeral pit after Digit Ship Six returned them to Message Bearer.

The Garden was in perpetual bloom. Seasons mixed here, created by differing intensities of light, warmth, moisture. The alien growths might require alterations in weather. He hoped otherwise. Winterhome would be hospitable to Garden life, if the humans actually persuaded anything to grow here.