Edmond Hamilton Valley of Creation

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force that rolled upon him.
He was overwhelmed by it, carried by it over the sheer brink of the world. He was falling
into an awesome, howling gulf that was outside space and time, was falling, falling-
A strange shock stopped his fall. And then he became dimly aware that sensation was
returning to him, that he was awaking.
"Is all well with you, Asha?" Nelson heard a thought-voice ask.
"All is well-and I am glad to have awaked from my sleep!" He heard the eager
he
answering thought. That was strange. The question had been answered by Asha, yet was
Asha the wolf-at least he dwelt in the wolfs body.
Or did he?
Nelson suddenly realized that half his sense-perceptions were gone, that he could no
longer scent anything at all. His body felt different. Not the tight, compact wolf-body to which
he'd grown accustomed, but a long, gangling, awkward body-
Nelson, with an inarticulate cry, wrenched his eyelids open. But he knew what he would
see before he looked
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128
down at himself. His hoarse wordless cry had been no wolf's howl but a human cry.
He looked down at the length of his own body again, sprawling in its dusty khaki uniform
on a padded cot, still wearing its thought-crown. He moved arms and legs and they
responded.
"I'm back," he whispered thickly.
"Yes," said a breathless voice. "You are back, Eric Nelson!"
He knew it for Nsharra's voice and he turned to look for her and looked full into the face
of Asha the wolf. They lay side by side on two narrow cots-the wolf whose mind had slept so
that a man could occupy his body-and the man.
Asha's body was dusty now, his hair matted with dried blood from wounds, his feet sore
and bleeding. But his bright green eyes looked intelligently into Nelson's face. Nelson turned
and looked up. Kree stood behind the cots, beside the big platinum mind-transference
machine of the ancients.
"You brought me back into my own body while I slept?" Nelson said hoarsely.
"Yes," said Kree. "The force of the ancients stunned you in sleep so that you did not
wake."
Nelson sat up. He felt strong, rested, fresh-and realized it was because his human body
strange.
had lain here in coma for so long. Yet his human body now felt He felt blinded and
deafened by his loss of scent, felt slow, clumsy, awkward.
He sat up and saw that Nsharra stood at the foot of his cot. And that the four leaders of
the great Clans were here-Tark and Hatha, the tiger and Ei. They were watching him.
"Death and danger walk toward Vruun on swift feet of flame," Kree was saying
somberly. "Little time was
THE WRATH OF THE CLANS
129
your
left to give Asha back his body and return you to body for judgment."
For judgment? That was why they had returned him to his humanity as doom drew close
to Vrunn? Then the time had come.
Nelson stood up and faced them all. "I am ready," he said heavily.
"Tark and Ei have told us how you fought to save Barin-how you fought your friends,"
said Kree.
"They were not my friends, save one who is dead now," Nelson answered heavily. "I did
not know, though, they were butchers."
"It seems you have learned much you did not know, outlander," said Kree. "You know
now what it will be like for the Clans if the Humanites break the Brotherhood."
"Yes, I know that now," answered Eric Nelson sickly. Free children of the forest, hunted
and slain and enslaved as in the outer world! Swift sentient folk of the Clans, crushed
beneath a stupid human tyranny! He deserved what was coming-
"You are free to leave L'Lan," said Kree. Nelson stared, incredulous. "You're not going
to kill me for what I've helped to do?"
Kree shook his head. "By your work last night, you redeemed the crime that you
committed in ignorance. You can go."
Nelson looked at the Guardian, then around the watching leaders of the Clans.
stay!"
"But I want to he cried. "I want to help you save the Brotherhood, to undo what I
helped do here!"
Nsharra cried eagerly to her father, "Give him the chance! He will be loyal to us, I know!" [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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