The Ringworld Throne

Black rubbed against white. Vala heard a squall like a mountain cat’s as the pale shape tore itself free and ran away along the shore, upstream.

The black shape couldn’t catch up. It stopped and cried, a desolate honk.

“How fast?” Tegger asked again.

“We’ll be down before halfnight, in time to wash. Then we’ll test our defenses, I think. Best if Cruiser Two stays high. Manack, you listening? Coriack?”

“I hear,” Coriack said. “Cruiser Two stays high till dawn.”

“Go tell Kaywerbrimmis. Then stay with Cruiser Two! I don’t want you alone on the slopes when night falls.”

Beedj was up and walking ahead and to the right, his crossbow cocked. Barok was tending the ca

The black hominid lay inconsolable on wet river mud. It presently rolled over and saw the descending cruiser. It waited.

Manack dropped from the ru

A vampire sang.

The music was unmistakable, thrilling along her nerves. Manack came to a jarring stop. Vala could see no target. The River Person waddled toward the bushes.

The second vampire stepped timidly out to meet it. Male, it was. It raised its arms imploringly. With the scent and the music going wild in her head, Vala fired.

The bullet struck beneath its armpit, slamming the vampire violently away. In the near-dark its blood was as red as any hominid’s. Vala caught a stronger whiff of its scent; she raised the towel and inhaled pepperleek.

Manack was hanging back. The River Person cast itself on the body. The vampire spasmed in agony, then relaxed.

Vala pulled the cruiser alongside both. Passengers were dropping from the ru

Slick black hair, short thick arms and legs, wide hands and feet, streamlined body … clothing. The River Woman’s torso was covered with some other creature’s brown fur. She looked up, then pulled away from the vampire male with visible effort.

“Greeting,” she said. “I am Wurblychoog—” a liquid flow of syllables and a trace of smile. You can’t pronounce that.

Vala said, “Greetings, Wurble. Valavirgillin. Why didn’t the vampire kill you?”

“This,” the woman said, and her hands waved down her barrel body. The garment was stiff around her throat. The sides were smooth leather, the hair shaved off. The rest, chest and back, were fur taken from some water beast.

She said, “We take a jell from a floating predator in Lake Deeps, half a daywalk across land. The jellfisher stings fish to eat them. The sting is in the jell. We smear an otter fur vest with jell, then shave off the fur where our arms lie when we swim. Vampires don’t like the sting, but after, must … must …” She turned to Manack. “Can swim, little courageous one? Can hold breath for a little while?”

“I would drown,” said Manack.

The River Woman told Vala, “Homeflow tribe has only four vests. Vampires bar us from shore, many falans now. If from time to time one of us wears a vest and lets a vampire embrace her, she may teach them to leave River People alone. Then we can hunt the shore for a time.”

“You show great courage.”

“I show my courage for Borubble, to take him for my mate.”

“And get some vampire scent on yourself, too,” Waast leered.

“Shubble flup! This is not to speak of. You, red one, can dive deep for only a few tens of breaths?”

Tegger shook his head. He was tired of the question. The River Woman sighed. “We hear rishathra. Never practice. Must mate! Will tell Borubble the good news. Will tell him visitors come, too. Stay here on mud flat, see vampires coming from a long way.”

She was across the mud and into the water before Vala could frame an intelligent reply.

Water could hide threats other than vampires. The whole team bathed with edged weapons in hand. Afterward Barok went upstream with the Gleaners to fish. Vala envied him a little, but she must remain to set up defenses.

Cruiser One spent the night on the mud flat. No visitors came, vampires or River People.

It was all going very smoothly, Vala thought. Very much according to prediction and plan. That worried her.

Three nights ago they had put a final shape to their plans.

Four Reds had come to the war. Warvia and Tegger had stayed, but two unmated males, Anakrin hooki-Whanhurhur and Chaychind hooki-Karashk, had been persuaded to return to Red territory carrying instructions that might be the saving of them all. Whand had had enough of vampires, and it seemed he and Spash had gotten pregnant. They would stay to refuel Cruiser Three. That left Valavirgillin and Kaywerbrimmis, the remaining drivers, split up to command two cruisers.

They’d chosen the teams early, then argued about it every night since.

Raking through a mountainous Grass Giant midden for several days had not improved the Machine People’s standing with these tribes. Vala was sure of that. But Grass Giant dung had yielded many barrels of saltpeter crystals.

The relief map outside the wall had become elaborate and wonderful. Only at halfnight and halfday was there light for Ghouls and the other species to work together on it; but they’d had a falan, seventy-five days, to do that. Dirt was replaced with colored clays. Once witnesses agreed on the shape of the land, they’d baked it hard under coals, and afterward used colored sand to mark possible routes for the cruisers. They were still moving those lines when night fell, and all retreated inside.

The vampires didn’t come every night, but they came in swarms.

Vampires didn’t learn, didn’t communicate. Moonwa had mounted the Marsh People’s curved window in the starboard-spin curve of the wall. The vampires attacked from starboard-spin, and warriors of four species killed them with guns and crossbows, firing around the edge of an invisible shield.

Vala had learned crossbows that way, several nights ru

The main building was a near-dome, fabric stretched over the top of a dirt wall, with a central pole. It was awesomely big, but awesomely crowded. Fifteen hundred Grass Giants—more women than men, a great many children, infants everywhere—made a stench rich enough to slice with a scythe-sword.

Wemb was in a cluster of wives. They were feeding her by hand, feeding themselves, too, and Wemb seemed to be enjoying it. Barok waved at her, and she waved back without getting up. Recovering nicely, Vala thought, from the night she and Barok had spent down among the vampires.

Barok would ride with Cruiser One. Vala had wondered if he would drop out of the game with Whand and Spash, or chase down the vampires who had taken his daughter.

Grass Giants were big, but they could stand crowding. For Machine People, Vala discovered, the problem was to avoid getting stepped on.

The Reds were prickly. Grass Giants steered clear of them.

If Reds and Machine People were feeling overmatched, why weren’t the even smaller Gleaners intimidated? But they’d found strategies that seemed to work. Some were playing with the children, some were grooming adults. Their nearsighted eyes found insect parasites with precision.

The Thurl pulled himself free of a ten of wives. He asked Vala, courteously and with no malice, “Do you have what you wanted of the shit pile?”

So, it was time to reveal a secret. “Yes, we thank you. When we mix the crystals with the sulfur and charcoal the Reds are gathering, we will have what propels our bullets.”

“Ah,” the Thurl said, hiding surprise.

He could not make gunpowder: he still didn’t know the proportions, Vala told herself. But now he knew that this was no mere Machine People perversion.

Into the quiet, vampire music insinuated itself, and quiet became silence.