Freedom's Landing

"Because I thought he was an escaped slave like me and hid him under the falls until the hunters left. Only then we got captured together," Kris said, which was true enough. "When I came to in the prison, I assumed he'd been released. Cattenis can't hold grudges more than twenty-four hours, you know." Mitford gave a curt nod of acknowledgement. "They must have hated him real bad to dump him in with us. Besides which, you'd only be doing the Cats' dirty work for them." Mitford scowled at her and she realized that she'd been clever to bring that up. "Hell's bells, man, they'd expect us to waste him, wouldn't they? So let's find out - first - what he knows. Then you can kill him." She said that cheerfully, hoping to God and little green apples that Mahomet would be able to show himself useful enough so that they wouldn't kill him. She found it odd in herself to think that way about the Catteni but he wasn't like the others "We sure could use some gen about this place,' Mitford agreed reluctantly, glancing around. He gave a convulsive twitch. "Place is too neat for an unsettled world and I'd rather know what we got to contend with now before we stumble into big kimchee with only knives and hatchets." He strode on then to the man who'd discovered the Catteni. He pointed in the proper direction and then followed them. It was Mahomet all right, and she bent down beside him, turning the heavy head to expose where t she'd belted him with the tool. A scar was there but it was well healed.

"Oho!" she said.

"Oho, what?" Mitford asked as the other men ranged themselves around Mahomet. Their expressions were unfriendly and most of them had knives in their hands.

She pointed to the scar. "I clobbered him there. And it's healed. We were a long time getting here."

"Kill him now before he wakes," Arnie said in a snarl, leaning over, knife-hand raised.

"NO!" Mitford's word snapped Arnie erect. "The girl's got something in keeping him alive and able to talk. Don't tell me he speaks English?" There was a little more respect for her in Mitford's eyes now and Kris realized that he'd been thinking she'd been Mahomet's toy.

"Enough lingua Barevi for us to understand him." She splashed the little water that was left in her cup over the Catteni's face and he reacted by lifting a hand to his face and moving stiffly from side to side. When his foot connected with someone's leg, she could see him tense. He drew his leg back and in one quick lithe movement was on his feet, arms held slightly out from his sides, alert and ready to defend himself despite the knife-carrying odds against him.

"Easy there," Kris said, stepping in front of him.

"Remember me?" He shot a quick glance at her but his eyes went right back to Mitford. Though the sergeant wasn't holding a knife, Mahomet had immediately taken him as the leader.

Kris gave him full marks for quick appraisals.

"Yes. You stole the commander's ffitter," he said in lingua Barevi.

"You did?" Arnie exclaimed. "You bitch!" And he shoved his face right up at her. His breath was vile but she held her ground and glared down at him, once again glad of the extra inches that had made her adolescence a trial. "I got force-whipped because of you!" He jerked his coverall off his shoulder so she could see the weals, still purple, on his skin. "So did fifty others at the discipline assembly they called because of you!

She's as bad as he is. No wonder she wasn't for killing him." Arnie glanced at the other hard faces, willing them to join him.

"Stuff it, Arnie," Mitford said, holding his right arm up in a karate chop position. "We can deal with her later, too, but let's first find out what this mother knows." Kris's mouth was dry all over again and she was scared cold. But she couldn't have let them just kill Mahomet out of hand. She owed him, if only because she'd put him in jeopardy before the twenty-four hour moratorium had passed. She was sure that was why he was stuck here with the rest of them. She'd inadvertently told the truth.

Cattenis had hated him enough to make sure he came to a dead end.

"Hey, Sarge," someone yelled across the field, and they looked over their shoulders. In the interval quite a few people had roused and were now homing in on the crates.

Reinforcements were needed.

"C'mon, you," Mitford said to Mahomet and jerked his head to indicate the Catteni should move with them. "And you," he added coldly to Kris.

Kris briefly considered a belated apology to Arnie and decided not to make the effort. Arnie didn't seem the forgiving type and she might even make matters worse.

Mahomet had not moved, and when two of the men swiped at him with their knives, he ignored them and gestured for Kris to precede him.

Quickly she fell in behind Mitford, hearing the surprise exclamations from the men.

"See how well he knows her," one of them said in a salacious tone of voice.

"She conked him, didn't she?"

"Yeah, but before or after, Murph?" "Before, Murph," she answered for herself, making her voice as strident as she could. That wasn't too difficult Iconsidering how scared she was. The situation had turned very ugly. "And that goes for anyone with the same dirty ideas." Looking straight ahead, she strode as confidently as she could back to the crates.

Once there, Mitford signed two of the men to take her and Mahomet behind the crates until he was finished with the new arrivals. He jumped up to his vantage point and, arms cocked on his belt, began his spiel. "I'm here to see that these supplies get doled out properly.