Jean Lorrah - Wulfston's odyssey

Wulfston could see the lake ahead… or was it a mirage formed by the waves of heat? He noticed the two dogs now moving straight ahead, no more forays to either side, and wondered if they could smell water.

With the thought, he was in their perceptions again, scenting the welcome wetness, sharing their thirst.

Their keen noses told them far more than their eyes-they could not see the zebra off to their left, but the not-quite-horse smell was as clear as the smell inside a stable to Wulfston.

It didn’t disturb Traylo and Arlus when Wulfston shared their perceptions, so he remained within their minds, hearing the sounds of birds huddling down as the danger passed, smelling a wider variety of scents than he had ever imagined, but seeing little.

It wasn’t just that the dogs’ eyes were so close to ground level; their way of seeing was different. There were not nearly as many colors as Wulfston was used to, and everything was slightly out of focus.

With human instinct, he tried to see more clearly, but the blur of tannish grass persisted. Suddenly there was a movement ahead. A startled rodent dropped the stalk it had been chewing on and scurried for its burrow, Arlus and Traylo in hot pursuit.

There were two rodents, one to the left and one to the right! He tried to turn toward one-then-

— tripped over a hummock and fell sprawling, the grass giving way to let him hit the ground with a bruising thump.

Back in his own senses, Wulfston realized what had happened: he had been looking through both dogs’

eyes at once, each seeing the same rodent from a different perspective.

He laughed as he picked himself up, and decided he would not do that again-at least until he had had more practice at watching where he was going while he Read something else!

Now he could definitely see the lake ahead. The dogs, having lost the little rodent, raced merrily into the shallow water and stopped to lap it up eagerly. Wulfston was not far behind them. He knelt, and dipped up water with his hands, then went in farther to cool off, trying to watch for dangerous animals as he splashed the water all over himself.

Feeling much better, he left the lake and began pacing along the shore, looking for a path that might indicate human use. All he saw were animal prints, and a flock of flamingos farther down the shoreline.

He couldn’t believe people didn’t come to this beautiful lake! Yet he saw no sign of villages or towns, no roads, no cultivated fields. He also saw no sheltered place where he could spend the night.

Although he was able to build a rapport with the animal life of the plain, the rodents and insects and little birds had no interest in man, except to avoid him. All he could tell was that there were no other people nearby; none of the animals gave him a perspective to tell whether there was a trail, even a road, beyond his line of sight.

Above the lake, however, soared a fish eagle, perhaps the same one he had seen in his first sensing of the lake that morning. I wonder - He hardly dared to think of it.

But that eagle could see the entire lake, and all the land surrounding it.

“Traylo! Arlus!” Wulfston called the dogs to him, and sat down cross-legged on the sandy shore.

The pups were wet, their fur standing up in points, and when they came to him they shook, spraying him with water. But they were panting, their tongues lolling out to give them a clownish look, and it was not hard to persuade them that they wanted to lie down next to him and groom their coats.

Even if the dogs fell asleep, they would be easily roused and, should he succeed at his daring idea, would pull Wulfston’s attention back at any sign of danger.

Readers and Adepts both learned relaxation and concentration exercises. Wulfston easily put himself into the quiet but ready state necessary for performing the most difficult and delicate of Adept functions, but instead of bracing himself to use those powers he let himself once again become attuned to the life about him. Slowly, hesitantly, he reached out to the eagle, trying to see what it saw.

Unlike the dogs, who welcomed his mental touch, the eagle merely allowed him to share its perceptions, and he sensed that it could and would drive him out if his presence became offensive. But all he wanted was to see-

— as he had never seen before!

The bird’s vision was as much sharper than Wulfstons as his was than the dogs’!

As he floated on the currents of air, the world spread below in brilliant, sharply defined array. One of the little rodents skittered through the grass; silver-hued fish swam beneath the surface of the lake; frogs hopped from one lily pad to another along the far shore. Just north of the area where Wulfston had come to the lakeshore, a herd of water buffalo grazed, some of them standing knee-deep in the water, pulling up the lush green weeds.

At first Wulfston could do no more than marvel at the view, and at the sensation of floating above the world, divorced from its cares or pleasures. He was master of his world, untouchable in his high flight.

He thrilled to the sensation of tendon and muscle reacting to each shift in the wind, feathers spreading and retracting, the great wings held effortlessly open, supporting him easily. The bird spiraled slowly, sliding down an invisible column of air, then caught an updraft and rose again, triumphant in the sun’s rays.

Wulfston had to struggle to make his own mind work, to look out the eagle’s eyes but analyze with a man’s mind. From here, his own path through the grassy plain was clear, as were the side trails the dogs had made. Their footprints along the lakeshore led as plainly as a cobbled street, and he could see himself, the dogs curled up on either side of him!

It was most disconcerting to observe his own body this way. He remembered Torio and Lenardo saying how disorienting it was, something belonging to the advanced stages of a Reader’s training. But this was not the same thing as a Reader’s visualizing. Their Code probably kept them from such a thing as looking through someone else’s eyes.

Still, he wished the bird would not focus on him that way; it was strange to see that tired-looking, scruffy man wearing nothing but a fraying silk shirt turned into a loincloth, and realize that it was himself. From this vantage point, he was the least significant object in the landscape.

The bird began another slow downward spiral, and this time Wulfston was better able to keep his mind on observing. Sure enough, he saw what he was looking for: perhaps half a mile farther along the lakeshore there was an inlet, and from it a road stretched southward-a wagon track, clearly showing twin paths of the wheels, with the grass trying to survive between.

There was his road to human habitation! In fact, in the eagle’s peripheral vision he thought he detected what might be man-made dwellings several miles away, but the bird would not oblige him by looking directly at them.

The eagle continued its lazy spiral, and Wulfston studied the landscape. There was more movement below- people on horses! They had intersected his trail from the south, and were turning to follow it toward the lake.

Who were they? “Look at them, eagle! Are they all black people, or are my white friends among them?

Look there! I have to know!”

With a shock that sent spasms of pain wrenching through his head, Wulfston was back in his own body.

Resenting his demands, the eagle had dismissed him from its mind.

Taking only long enough to quell the pain, Wulfston climbed to his feet and ran back along his own trail.

He was sure the horsemen were looking for him. But were they Sukuru’s people, or Zanos and Astra?

Backtracking through the grass, Wulfston saw how easy he would be to follow-but perhaps they weren’t expecting him to come to meet them. One thing concerned him: even on the edges of the eagle’s peripheral vision, surely Zanos’ bright red hair would have stood out, had the gladiator been there. Best consider these people his enemies until they proved otherwise.