The Miocene Arrow by Sean McMullen

Author:Sean McMullen
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates
Published: 2012-05-22T04:00:00+00:00

5 October 3960: Wind River

Maesterrin had not been allowed to sleep for more than minutes since he had been taken prisoner in Casper. It might have been ten days ago, it might have been fifteen, it might have even been a month: he had no way of knowing. He had been gagged and hooded before being put aboard a regal and flown west. He knew it to be west, because aviads had a birdlike magnetic sense that allowed them to “feel” direction. Maesterrin had counted slowly for the whole trip, and he knew the cruising speed of regals. From all this he estimated that he was somewhere just east of the Wind River Range and north of the Red Desert. This would be of use when he escaped. When he escaped. Like all the aviad infiltrators he held humans in contempt and had no doubt that he would quickly outwit them.

He was proved wrong. There was the scent of pine trees and recent rain on the air when the regal landed, and the walk to his prison was 1,670 steps northeast of the wingfield. He was untied, changed into a light bushfiber smock, then tied again. At last his blindfold was removed. The room was cold, but brightly lit by high lamps. An interrogator entered, a well-spoken but thickset man wearing a tight-fitting knitted hood. His eyes were blue, Maesterrin could see, that.

The Yarronese knew his name, place in the tramway system, and details since arriving at Casper. They also knew that he was what they called a Callwalker. They had somehow worked out the hair test—or there was a traitor among his comrades. Maesterrin refused to even acknowledge his name at first, but the Yarronese were masters at applying pain. A slight squeeze to his elbow would send a thunderflash of agony through his body, and they could do worse with his knees. He eked out information, some true, some false. The interrogator took it all down: how he came from north of Alberhaven, where he had grown up in a lost tribe of Callwalkers. When they had wandered into Alberhaven in search of new hunting grounds the humans there had captured them, then convinced them to become part of a scheme to conquer Yarron in return for gunwing technology from Bartolica.

Maesterrin ate his meager meals of watery soup and dried fruit straight from the bowl, as his hands remained tied at all times. His legs were untied, so that he could visit the privy pot in one corner at will. It was seldom emptied.

One night—or day—the interrogator came in with a clipboard and left the door open behind him. Maesterrin wondered if security was growing slack, but when the interrogator took him by the arm and led him outside he saw that three very alert carbineers were waiting to guard him.

“We are disappointed with you, Fras Maesterrin,” said the interrogator as they walked.

Maesterrin flinched at the form of address from the other side of the world. He pressed his lips together as the interrogator went on.

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