Midworld by Alan Dean Foster Page B

have died in the interim.”
    The hunter stared back at her with the patient look one reserves for very young children. “I had to be sure the tesshanda would not object to my taking its fruit, since it was not yet quite ripe.”
    Both Logan and Cohoma appeared confused. “Are you saying,” she went on, “that you had to ask that plant’s permission? That you talked to it?”
    “I did not say that,” Born explained easily. “I emfoled it.”
    “Emfoled? Oh, you mean you felt the fruit to see if it was ripe—enfolded it.”
    Born shook his head. “No … emfoled. You do not emfol with your plants?”
    “I guess not, since I’ve no idea what you’re talking about, Born.”
    He looked satisfied without being pleased. “Ah, that explains much.”
    “Not to me, it doesn’t,” Cohoma replied. “Look, Born, are you saying you talked or conversed with that plant and that it gave you an okay to pick a fruit before it was ripe?”
    “No, no, I emfoled it. If the fruit was ripe, I would not have had to, of course.”
    “Why of course?” Logan asked, feeling the conversation growing steadily more tenuous.
    “Because then the tesshanda would have emfoled me .”
    “Some kind of ritual superstition,” she muttered. “The logic trappings are intriguing. Wonder where it sprang from? Give me a hand up, Jan.” He did so and she immediately winced, bent over and held her stomach.
    “Can you walk?” Born inquired, still patient “No, but I’m an accomplished stumbler.” She forced a sickly grin. “Talk about the cure being worse than the disease … I don’t think you’d make it as a Commonwealth physician, van Born, but this is the second time you’ve saved my life. Thanks.”
    “Third time,” Born told her without explaining. “We are near to the Home, now. Another half-level up and two or three levels distant.” Both giants groaned.
    “I’ve never seen a tree like that, not on Survey or in any of the other reports,” Cohoma announced when they had their first sight of the Home.
    “You haven’t been keeping up, Jan,” his partner admonished. “The next to the last eastward skimmer brought back the details on it. It’s called a weaver. The central trunk hardly narrows at all till it attains the five- or six-hundred-meter level. Then it splits and resplits into an interlocking maze of trunklets that form a … well … a kind of enormous central basket in the tree. Then the subtrunks re-combine a few dozen meters higher to form a single bole again that reaches all the way to the forest top. According to the report the branches of the trunklet cage are lined with a red fruit, mostly sugar pulp around a nutlike center, that’s about as rich in nourishment components as anything found locally so far—and rich in niacin, of all things.” She pointed as they neared the first trunklets and walked along a thick tuntangcle. “See those pods growing from the pink blossoms? According to the report, if you brush against one, you get a face full of pollen. If you breathe that stuff, it’s good-bye, according to the lab analysis. Fungal spores settle in the lungs and esophagus, spread instantly and choke you inside two minutes.”
    She was suddenly aware that Born showed no sign of swerving from the deadly flower-sprouting vines. “We’re going around this tree, aren’t we, Born? There can’t be a poison here your people don’t know about.”
    “Go around?” Born eyed her oddly. “This tree is the Home.” He approached the tangle of flower-laden vines and branchlets.
    “Born …” She followed him slowly, her eyes on the deadly pods. One touch would send a shower of suffocating pollen into the air.
    Born stopped at the first vine, leaned over, and spat directly into one of the broad blooms, avoiding the swollen pod. A shiver appeared to pass through the vine as the glistening petals closed on themselves. The shiver continued. Then, like a twig curling back from flame, the vines tightened,