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wrist, using it in place of the occupied hand. It was a very tiring and awkward posture, but he had
climbed all his life.
Not stopping to rest, he inched up steadily until he reached the first branch. Then he hooked an
arm over it, swung his body up with a jerk, clamped a leg over another branch, and in a short time had
deposited the fledgling with two of his brothers. They barked small-throated welcomes. The parents
were nowhere to be seen.
When he got down, he saw the siren looking at him with shining eyes.
"You have a tender heart beneath that angry mouth, Jack Cage."
He shrugged. What would she say if she knew he'd helped bury her cousin, Wuv?
They resumed walking. She said, "If you want to go to Farfrom, why don't you just go?"
"As the eldest son, I'll inherit most of the farm. My father depends on me. He'd be heartbroken if
I were to give up my future here and study under a man he considers to be a black magician, a mind
doc-tor.
"Besides," he ended lamely, "I haven't the money I need to live on while I'm studying."
"Do you quarrel often with your father?" He decided not to take offense at that question. Horstels
weren't expected to have human manners.
"Often."
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"Over that?"
"Over that. Father's a rich farmer. He could send me away for four years. But he won't.
Sometimes I think I'll leave anyway and work my way through Roodman's Academy. But my mother
gets sick when I talk of going. My sisters cry. Mother would like me to be a priest, though she never
stops to think that the Church is likely to send me far away and that I'd seldom return.
"It's true I could, as a priest, study psychic science by applying for entrance in the Thomistic
College. But there is no guarantee I'd be admitted. And even if I did get in, I'd be under strict control in
research. I'd not be a free agent, as I would under Roodman.
"Something else. If I became a priest, I'd have to marry at once. I don't want a wife and children.
Not just now. Maybe later.
"Of course, if I entered the Philippian Order, I'd be a monk. But I don't want that, either."
He paused for breath. He was astonished that he had picked himself up, so to speak, like a
pitcher, and poured himself out. And to a siren, at that.
But, he comforted himself, he often spoke his problems to Samson. She was in the same class as
the dog. And the results were also the same. She would not report what he'd said to his parents.
"Perhaps if you found something that would free you financially, you might be able to decide."
"If I'd taken the dragon's head, I'd have had enough. Lord How's reward, plus the Queen's
bounty, would have made it."
"Was that why you were so angry when you found out we had made a contract with it?"
He nodded. "One of the reasons. I --"
"If it weren't for those agreements, human territories would be ravaged," she interrupted. "You've
no idea how terrible or how invulnerable they are. They could devastate a farm in one night, kill all the
animals, and uproot the houses.
"Moreover, if it weren't for the contract, you'd be dead now. The dragon said she could have
surprised you half a dozen times.''
His woodsman's pride was stung. He barked out a four-letter word that had spanned many
centuries and many light-years unchanged. "I can take care of myself! I don't need any siren to tell me
how!"
He walked on silently, hot and tired and irritated.
"How would you like a loan?" she said. "Enough to take you through school?''
Itwas a day of shocks.
"Loan? Why? With what? You horstels don't use money."
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"Let met put it this way. First, we know this man Roodman. We think his psychology is correct,
and we'd like to see it spread. If enough humans become psychically cleansed of their aberrations, they
may be able to ease the terrible tension between them and us and avert the war that is otherwise
inevitable.
"Second, you may not know it, but the Wiyr have long had their eye on you. They know that you
are -- consciously or unconsciously -- sympathetic to us. They want to develop that.
"No. Don't protest. Weknow.
"Third, we are trying to get representation in your Parliament, human representatives to sit in the
Houses for us. If we do, we think that someday, after you mature, you would make a good delegate for
the Slashlark County Wiyr.
"Fourth, you need money to go to college. We'll give you what you want. All that's necessary is
that you make the usual verbal contract. My father, the Blind King, may be the recorder, if you wish. Or
if not, anybody else will do. And if you insist, you may have a human lawyer draw up papers -- for your
con-venience. We, of course, will have nothing to do with that."
Jack said, "Wait a minute! You've not even seen your folks. How do you know what they're
planning for me? And how did you get the authority to offer me a loan?"
"That's easily explained. But you wouldn't believe me if I told you. As to authority, any adult has
it. I'm an adult."
"Then quit using child-talk! I'm not an infant. And -- and how can I know these things unless I
ask?"
"True. Now, what's your decision?"
"Why -- that'll take time. Your offer is something I never heard of. It has many angles that have
to be considered carefully."
"A horstel would make up his mind at once."
He bared his teeth and shouted, "I'm not a hor-stel! And there is the meat of the matter. I'm not a
horstel, and the answer is no! Why, if I took money from you, do you know what the people around here
would call me?Dog-eater! I'd be ostracized; my father would kick me out of his house. Nothing doing.
No!"
"Not even a loan just to go to Roodman's Academy? No strings attached?"
"No!"
"Very well. I'm going back to my uncle's. Good-bye until we meet again, Jack Cage."
"Farewell," he growled, and he began walking down the road. Before he'd gone two yards, he
heard her call.
He turned, pulled around in spite of himself. She'd sounded so urgent.
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She had her hand up in a sign for silence. Her head was cocked. "Listen. Hear that?"
He strained his ears. He thought he could make out a very low rumbling to the west. It wasn't
thun-der; he was sure of that. And the sound faded out now and then.
Samson was a yellow statue, pointed to the west. His throat-rumble echoed that in the forest.
"What do you think it is?" he asked.
"I'm not sure."
"The dragon?" He drew the scimitar.
"No. If it were, I wouldn't investigate. But if it's what I think it is. . ."
"Yes?"
"Then. . ."
She walked into the dark shadows thrown by the tall spearnuts, towering copperwoods, and
tangled vines growing overhead. He followed, curved steel in hand. They zigzagged perhaps a mile as the
bear am-bles, perhaps a quarter-mile as the lark flies. Several times he had to cut away a barricade of
vines or stingbushes. It was the thickest and most im-penetrable growth he'd ever seen. Though close to
the farm, it seemed never to have been explored.
Finally she stopped. An arm of sunlight had pushed through a hole in the green ceiling and spread
its fingers over her red-yellow hair. Haloed, she stood there, listening, and Jack, behind her, forgot about
their quest long enough to admire her. If he were a painter, like her uncle. . .!
Suddenly the noise came to life close by. She started, and she and the light seemed to break into
pieces. The next he knew, she had glided into the shadows.
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