F. Wilson - The Tery

Rab emptied his ancient metallic volumes from the drapery that had served as a sack, and spread it on the ground. He stared at the tery expectantly.

After a brief, tense moment, the tery gently placed Adriel on the cloth and folded it over her. Feeling a sob building in his throat, he straightened and started to move toward the forest depths.

"Where are you going?"

"Away. I don't belong here."

"Yes, you do. Or at least, you will. You'll be a hero among the Talents."

"I'll still be a pet."

What had been amusing before seemed intolerable now.

"You don't have to remain one."

"You'll tell them?" Hope began to grow. "Explain to them?"

"I'll help you become a man in their eyes. The Talents won't accept you as one right away, and they may even reject you if we push your humanness on them too forcefully. So we'll start slowly. You'll talk more and more; you'll start to use tools. I'll guide you. Before I'm through I'll have them thinking of you as a man before I ever get around to telling them. And the first thing to do will be to give you a name."

The tery turned and watched Rab's eyes as he spoke. Only one other man had ever looked at him that way.

Rab held out his hand. "Will you stay…brother?"

The tery looked away and said nothing. Moving slowly, almost painfully, he returned to Adriel's side. Lowering himself to his knees, he slumped and hung his head over her, wondering what to do. He remained in that position for a long time. He sensed Rab moving away to sit quietly with his back against a tree.

The tableau was broken by the sound of someone crashing through the underbrush nearby. Both were on their feet immediately: Rab half-hidden behind the tree trunk, the tery crouched over Adriel, ready to spring.

A lone man broke into view. Tlad.

Tlad stopped at the edge of the clearing and stared at Adriel's inert form.

"Is she hurt?"

The tery sensed real concern in his voice.

Rab cautiously stepped out from behind his tree.

"No. Just drugged. Who are you?"

"I'm called Tlad. The tery here can vouch for me."

Rab glanced sharply in the tery's direction. "He knows?"

The tery nodded — a very human gesture he had picked up — and lowered himself to all fours next to Adriel.

"He is a good friend. I don't know how he knows, but he does — perhaps for a long time. Maybe he is a tery, too."

The tery was beginning to feel the physical, mental, and emotional strain of the night's events. His mind and body were numb. A great weight seemed to press down on his chest and shoulders, making it hard to stand.

Everything was coming apart. He wanted to lie down and let it all pass. He felt adrift…lost…stripped of his identity. His place in the world had been torn from him: He was no longer a tery, he was a human. But he could neither live as a human nor be accepted as one. Nothing added up. He knew Tlad should not have been able to find them, yet he had. The tery did not have the will to wonder how.

Not so Rab, who had regained his composure and was wasting no time in satisfying his curiosity. His voice seemed to echo down a long tunnel to the tery.

"How did you know to look for us here?"

"I have my —" Tlad began, but stopped short.

"Is something wrong?"

But Tlad did not answer. Instead, he rushed to where the ancient volumes had been spilled from the drapery and knelt to inspect them in the growing light.

"These are yours?"

"Yes."

"Where did you find them?"

"In the ruins near Mekk's fortress when I lived there."

"Then you must be the one the Talents have been waiting for. Rab, isn't it?"

"Yes, but you're not one of us."

"Right." Tlad continued speaking as he flipped through each of the volumes. "But they're not far behind me. They're heading directly for the keep. I suggest you let them know where you are. They should be in range."

Rab looked off into the forest for a moment, then returned his attention to Tlad.

"There. They know we're safe and where we are. Should be here soon. Now, tell me what —"

"Where's Volume Five?" Tlad quickly ran through the four volumes a second time. "Did you lose it?"

With a dumbfounded expression, Rab sat down with a jolt on the other side of the pile of books.

"Who are you? I'm the only one who can read these things. How could you know that Volume Five is missing? This is the only set."

"Wrong." Tlad said, voice low, words hurried. "I come from a fishing village but never had much of a bent for the sea. So as a boy I used to comb the ruins up the coast. I found a similar set and brought it to the village elder who knew how to read some of the ancient writing. He kept the books for a long time, and when he was finally through with them, he made me row him out past the reef. As we sat in the boat, he swore me to secrecy and told me what the books contained. Then he threw all five overboard."

"Then this is not the only set," Rab said.

"No. And there may be others."

"This means you know about the Shapers and the Teratols, and the truth about the Talents and the teries."

"I also know the contents of Volume Five."

"Then you know more than I do," Rab said. "I never got to translate that one."

"Then it's lost?"

"No. One of Kitru's officers is on his way to Mekk's fortress with it now."

Tlad shot to his feet. " No! "

The violence of Tlad's reaction penetrated the mental fog enveloping the tery. He rose and padded toward the pair.

"What's in the fifth volume?" Rab asked.

Tlad hesitated, then seemed to reach a decision.

"Volume Five tells of the final days of the Teratol society and how they gathered all their records, their techniques, and their hardware into a huge underground cache. Among the items they hid were the super weapons they used to keep the underclasses in line. Volume Five gives the location of that cache."

Rab too was on his feet now. "And it's on its way to Mekk!"

"If that madman gets his hands on those weapons, there won't be a forest left to hide in. He'll have everything that doesn't bear True Shape — whatever that happens to mean at the time — hunted down and destroyed. And a lot of other things will get destroyed along the way. Maybe everything. Is there any way we can intercept that officer?"

"No," Rab said with a quick shake of his head. "Dennel told me that the messenger was scheduled to leave during the night. He's long out of reach by now."

"Dennel?" Tlad said. "Where is he?"

Rab explained what had happened inside the keep.

Tlad nodded and glanced the tery's way. "I suspected Dennel was up to no good."

"He's not important now," Rab said. "I must know: Where is the cache?"

"If the maps were accurate, right under Mekk's fortress. The Teratols seemed to think it was pretty safe — you had to go through the Hole to get to it."

Rab started. "The Hole? Then it's unquestionably safe."

Tlad said, "Surely the Hole is empty now."

"No. The offspring of the original inhabitants still dwell there — no one dares to let them out. And no one enters the Hole willingly. Don't worry: The cache is safe."

"I wouldn't count on it. If Mekk learns that the Hole stands between him and the power to destroy anything that displeases him, he'll find a way around it or through it. He'll get to that cache."

"Then we're doomed."

"Not if we get there first."

"And they call me crazy," Rab said with a humorless laugh. "How do we do that?"

Tlad tugged at his beard. "I can't say. I'm from the coast. I don't know much about Mekk's fortress."

"You certainly know your way around the forest."

"I live in the forest now — I'm a potter, not a fisherman. But there must be some way we can get into the fortress and retrieve that book."