Poul Anderson - Hunter's Moon

Her next knowledge was of lying on turf under a hasty, red-lit sky. A human crouched above her, talking to a small box that replied in the voice of Hugh. Behind, the Flyer lay shrunken, clutching a bush. Storm brawled; the first stinging raindrops fell.

In the hidden way of hunters, she knew that she was dying. The human might staunch those cuts and stabs, but could not give back what was lost.

Memory—what she had heard tell, what she had briefly tasted herself—“Blood of the Flyer. It will save me. Blood of the Flyer, if he will give.” She was not sure whether she spoke or dreamed it. She sank back into the darkness.

When she surfaced anew, the Flyer was beside her, embracing her against the wind. The human was carefully using a knife on a tendril. The Flyer brought the tendril in between Erakoum’s fangs. As the rain’s full violence began, she drank.

A double sunrise was always lovely.

Jannika had delayed telling Hugh her news. She wanted to surprise him, preferably after his anxiety about his dromid was past. Well, it was; Erakoum would be hospitalized several days in Port Kato, which ought to be an interesting experience for all concerned, but she would get well. A’i’ach had already rejoined his Swarm.

When Hugh wakened from the sleep of exhaustion which followed his bedside vigil, Jannika proposed a dawn picnic, and was touched at how fast he agreed. They flitted to a place they knew on the sea cliffs, spread out their food, and sat down to watch.

At first Argo, the stars, and a pair of moons were the only lights. Slowly heaven brightened, the ocean shimmered silver beneath blue, Phrixus and Helle wheeled by the great planet. Wild songs went trilling through air drenched with an odor of roanflower, which is like violets.

“I got the word from the Center,” she declared while she held his hand. “It’s definite. The chemistry was soon unraveled, given the extra clue we had from the reviving effect of blood.”

He turned about. “What?”

“Manganese deficiency,” she said. “A trace element in Medean biology, but vital, especially to dromids and their reproduction—and evidently to something else in ouranids, since they concentrate it to a high degree. Hansonia turns out to be poorly supplied with it. Ouranids, going west to die, were removing a significant percentage from the ecology. The answer is simple. We need not try to change the ouranid belief. Temporarily, we can have a manganese supplement made up and offer it to the dromids. In the long run, we can mine the ore where it’s plentiful and scatter it as a dust across the island. Your friends will live, Hugh.”

He was quiet for a time. Then—he could surprise her, this son of an outback miner—he said: “That’s terrific. The engineering solution. But the bitterness won’t go away overnight. We won’t see any quick happy ending. Maybe not you and me, either.” He seized her to him. “Damnation, though, let’s try!”