The Burning City by Jerry Pournelle Page A

cloudy, and just after breakfast Miss Bertrana came into the kitchen and took Shanda by the hand. “Your father wants you,” she said. “In your pink dress. There are visitors.”
    Shanda looked pained. She turned to Whandall. “I’m sorry…”
    â€œThat’s all right,” Whandall said. “I’d better go home.”
    â€œYes, but have some of my corn cake,” Serana said. “I like to see a boy with a good appetite.”
    â€œWhere did you say you lived?” Miss Bertrana asked.
    Whandall pointed vaguely to the west. “Over near the wall, ma’am…”
    â€œWell. Miss Shanda will be busy all day. Tomorrow too.”
    â€œYes, ma’am. Too bad, Shanda.”
    â€œAre they showing me off?” the little girl asked.
    â€œI wouldn’t put it that way, but it’s Lord Wyona’s family.” Miss Bertrana said the name reverently. “Come on; you’ll have to change.”
    Shanda hesitated a moment. “You’ll come back?”
    Serana was at the stove rattling pans. “It takes two days each way,” Whandall whispered.
    â€œPlease?”
    â€œI’ll be back,” he said. “Really. I just don’t know when.”
    â€œNext time we’ll get to the forest.” Shanda lowered her voice. “I’ll leave some things for you in my room, in the chest. You can have all the boys’ clothes there.”
    The chest was nearly full, and Whandall couldn’t tell the boys’ clothes from the girls. Most of the things were too small anyway. Shoes: fancy, not sturdy. They wouldn’t last a week in Serpent’s Walk. There was far more stuff here than he could carry, and even if he could carry it, what then? He’d look like a gatherer. If the Lordsmen didn’t catch him, his own people would.
    There were boys in the yard playing a complicated game. Hide and run, track and pounce. Imitation Lordkin. Pitiful. Whandall watched them while he thought.
    He’d need an outfit, a way to blend in here when he returned. But anything that would blend in here would stand out in Serpent’s Walk. A Lordkin had to be crafty.
    It came to him that he could wear his own clothes underneath, then two more layers of Lord’s clothing topped by the loose jacket, and still not look too odd. Those boys were all bulkier than he was. They ate better—and more often.
    When he was dressed, he felt bulky. He left Shanda’s room carefully, with a twinge of regret for all the stuff he was leaving behind, too much to gather. He left by going over the wall. Guards might notice how much he was wearing.
    No one paid any attention to him while he was in the area near the Lordshills. There were people and carts on the road. No one offered him a ride, but no one stopped him either. At the top of the ridge he stopped and looked back at the Lordshills and their wall. Then went on. He knew where he could sleep safely.
    The Pit was beginning to seem a friendly place. The moon was still near full. The light picked up the shadows of predators coming to greet him while he made himself comfortable. Through the ghosts’ restless pockets in the fog he watched some larger shadow. He couldn’t see it move, but every time he dozed and woke, it was nearer yet.
    Then he saw something swing above it—a limb—and he knew its shape.
    It was twice the size of one of the giant cats, with a rounded body, and it was upside down. It was hanging from an imaginary cylinder, perhapsthe branch of a tree eons dead, by its four inward-curving hands. Its head hung, possibly watching Whandall himself. One of the tremendous cats suddenly discovered it, turned, and sprang, and then the horde of beasts was tearing it into wisps. The creature fought back, and birds and giant wolves too became drifting shreds of fog.
    In the morning he put on everything he had, with his old clothes on top of it all. He looked bulky and he