Moon Mirror (4 page)

But the Lady Carola had no pleasure in the crown when he offered it to her. Instead, flames of anger danced in her eyes.

“You are very clever, stranger!” Her voice was the hiss of a serpent. “Once you have won, but not twice, 1 think. Listen to the second task I set you:

“In the stable stands a roan mare which it is my will to ride. But since the beast is mad and attacks all who would approach it, it has never been saddled. Bring it hither gentled, stranger, and I shall believe that you have powers greater than mine!

“So be it, Lady,” replied Franz calmly.

Now Franz was city bred and knew but little of horses.

However, it was plain to the most ignorant that the roan that the guards showed him was not only mad, but in its madness it was driven by a hate against all mankind. It reared and beat its hoofs against the wall, baring teeth at those who would come near it, restrained only by the heavy chains at its bridle.

“Within the hour, fool,” laughed the captain, “we shall return to carry hence what is left of you.”

“A most courteous act,” returned Franz quietly. He waited until they had left the stable before he brought out the snuffbox.

“Give me now what will best master this demon,” he asked of it.

Over the rim of the snuffbox fell a ball of rosy light which grew larger as it rolled across the floor until it lay quiet before the mare. The tall horse stood still, its eyes fixed upon the light. Franz ventured to lay a hand on a quivering flank. The horse did not move.

So did it continue to stand statue-still while Franz, with many rumblings, saddled it. Then it allowed the toymaker to lead it out, while the ball rolled before them. Thus Franz brought the mare through the crowd of awestricken men into the great hall.

At the sight of the mare, the Lady Carola shrank back in her seat. But the flames in her eyes grew, and her mouth was straight and grim.

“Twice you have won, stranger!” Her voice arose in a
harsh scream of rage. “But for you there shall be no third victory. Ten years upon ten years ago the Princess Katha went from among us, leaving this city in my hands. And no man knows whither she went. Bring her back to this high seat! That I ask of you now, little man who would match wits with me!”

For the last time Franz touched the snuffbox and muttered his wish. But nothing happened. And he knew, with a sinking heart, that three wishes only had that box held, and he had used them all. As he stood there defenseless, the Lady Carola laughed.

“So do I win! Seize him, guards!”

But Franz was desperate, and he turned to the nearest man-at-arms, snatching the spear from his hands. He hurled it swiftly, not at any who moved upon him, but at that ball of light which held the wild horse captive.

There was the tinkling of breaking crystal, and fast upon it came the scream of the mare released from the thrall the ball had laid upon her, ready to turn on them all. The Lady Carola cowered in the high seat.

“No!” she screamed. “Be as you were! Be as you were!”

And the mare was gone. In its place stood a girl with a banner of red-gold hair flying about her shoulders and a high, proud look about her such as a queen might wear.

“At last!” Her voice carried through the hall. “At last your spell is broken, Carola, and we two come to an accounting!”

To that the Lady Carola made no answer. She crouched, babbling; nor did she ever again speak a word of sense. Thus
did the Princess Katha return to her city. And with her coming, the dark cloud which had held its towers in thrall was whirled away and the sun shone brightly once more in its streets and squares.

To Franz the Princess Katha offered a place at court and what honors it was in her power to bestow. But he returned a straight and honest answer.

“Liege Lady, in my hands lies my fortune. I want only to be left to use my skill as best I may.”

So did there appear in that city a toy shop. And, since peace and plenty were there also, Franz indeed found the home of his dreams. By the princess’ will he served upon her council, and it was often noted that when a matter of import was to be decided, Master Franz fingered a golden snuffbox until he gave his word upon the matter. It was his luck, he sometimes said.

TEDDI

J
oboy was still crying when the Little used the stunner on him. Me, I had to lie there, with that tangler cord around my feet, and watch. Had to keep quiet, too. No use getting myself blasted when maybe I could still take care of Joboy.

“Take care of Joboy . . .” I'd been hearing that ever since he was born. Nats have to learn to take care early, with Little hunting packs out combing the hills and woods for them. Those packs are able to pick off the Olds early, but in the beginning, we kids aren't too much larger than the Littles, and we can hide out. We can't hide out forever, though. We have to eat, and in winter there isn't much to find in the hills—which
means raiding down in Little country. Sooner or later, of course, we run into their traps, as Joboy and I did that night.

I was scared, sure, but I was more scared for Joboy. He had never been down in the fields before. I usually hid him out when I went food-snitching, but this time he had refused to stay behind. And then. . ..

All because of an old, dirty piece of fur stuffed with dried grass! I could have cried myself, only I wasn't going to let any Little see me do that. Joboy, he was just a kid, and it was his Teddi that had gotten us into this. I could see the darned thing now. One of the Littles had kicked it against the field wall, and now it sat there looking back at me, with that silly, stupid grin on its torn face.

Da had brought Teddi back to the cave when Joboy was still a baby. It was from the lowlands but not Little-made. Da told Joboy silly stories about Teddi—kid stuff, but Joboy sure liked them. After Da went out that day and never came back, Joboy wanted me to tell them, too. First I tried to remember what Da had said. Then I just added extra things out of my own head. I think Joboy thought Teddi was alive. Once, when he got torn and lost some of his insides, Joboy went wild. I stuffed Teddi with grass and tried to patch him up, but I wasn't too good at it.

Joboy carried him all the time, but that night he dropped Teddi when I found the potatoes, and when he reached for him again, he set off the alarm, and the Littles were right on us.

They used a tangler on me quick. Guess they must have known I was a raider and knew most of the tricks. I told Joboy
to beat it, and he might have gotten away if he hadn't tried to get Teddi again. So there we were; the Littles had us, but good.

Now they stood around us, looking us over as if we were animals. I guess, to the Littles, that's what we Nats were. I wondered if they knew just how much we hated them! Littles—I could have spit right in their nasty, screwed-up faces. Only I didn't—not when they had Joboy and maybe would make him pay for what I did.

There were only six of them. Put me on my feet, free, and I could— But I knew I couldn't, ever. They had tanglers and stunners. What did we have? Stones and sticks. Da had had a gun but nothing left to shoot out of it. It was at the back of our cave now, leaning against the wall, not as much good as a well-shaped club would be.

The six of them were wearing the green suits of a hunting pack. They had come down on us in one of their copters. The Littles have everything—cars, planes, you name it—but we can't use them; they're all too small. Maybe Joboy could squeeze into the pilot's seat in a copter, but he wouldn't know how to fly it.

Joboy lay there as if he were dead, but he was only stunned—so far. I tried not to guess what they would do to us. We were Nats, and that made us things to be hunted down and gotten rid of.

A Little walked over to me and looked right down into my eyes. His eyes were cold and hard, like his face. Yet once we were the same, Littles and Nats. They never seem to think of that, and I guess we don't much, either.

“You, Nat"—he nudged my shoulder with the toe of his boot—"where's your filthy nest? Any more of you back there?” I'm sure he didn't expect any answer. If he had dealt with us before, he should have known he would get none.

Da warned us long ago not to team up with any other Nats. More than one family of us together was easy hunting. Most of us stayed on our own. We were cautious about meeting strange Nats, too. Sometimes the Littles had tame Nats—ones they could control—sent into the hill country to nose us out. However, no Nat ever spilled to the Littles unless he was brain-emptied, so the less we knew, the better. They might backtrack us to the cave, but that wouldn't do them any good. Da had been gone since last winter, and Mom, though I still remembered her, had died of the coughing sickness when Joboy was only a baby. Maybe they would find Da's hiding places and the books, but that didn't matter much at this point. They had us, and there was no escaping from a Nat pen, once you were dumped in. Or was there? You heard stories, and I could keep my eyes and ears open. . . .

“No more of us,” I told him truthfully. “Just Joboy and me.”

He made a face as if I smelled bad. “Two's two too many. Sent for the pickup yet, Max?” He spoke to the one putting his stunner back in his belt after he had attended to Joboy.

“On its way, chief.”

I wondered if I should cry a bit, let them see me scared. But then they might stun me, too. Better be quiet and try to find a way to— But there was no way. When I realized that, it was
like really having the stunner knock me out, only I wasn't able to sleep. I had to lie and think about it.

They didn't pay me any more attention, because they didn't have to; that tangler held me as if I were shut up in a cave, with a rock too big to push filling the entrance. One of them wandered over to Teddi, laughed, and kicked him. Teddi sailed up in the air and came right apart at a seam. I was glad Joboy didn't see that, and I hated them worse than ever. I hated until I was all hate and nothing else.

Pretty soon one of their trucks came along. The two men in the front got out. We were picked up, gingerly, as if the Littles hated even to touch us, and dumped in the back. I landed hard and it hurt, and I was glad Joboy couldn't feel it when he landed.

I had time to think as the truck ran along through the night, heading for one of their cities—cities that had once been ours, too. How long ago? I wondered.

Da could read the books. He could write, too. He made Joboy and me learn. Once he said that the Littles thought we were no better than animals, but that there was no need for us to prove them right. He made us learn about the past, as much as he knew.

Littles began quite a while back, when there were too many people in the world. The people built too many houses and too many roads, ate too much, and covered all the country. A lot of people began to worry, and they had different ideas as to what could help. The cities, especially, were traps, overpopulated and full of bad air.

None of their ideas seemed to work—until they started on the Littles. They found a way to work on a person's body, even before he was born, so that he started life a lot smaller and never did grow very big. His children were small, too, and so it went, on and on. The big cities now could house more and more people. They didn't have to build more and bigger roads, because the cars were made smaller and smaller, to match the Littles. Littles didn't need so much food, either, so less land was needed to produce what was required.

There were some people, however, who thought this was all wrong, and they refused to take the treatment to make their children little. When the government passed laws that said everyone
had
to be a Little, the Naturals—the Nats—moved to places where they thought they could hide. Then the Littles began to hunt them.

Da's people, way back, had been leaders against the idea of making Littles, because they had found out that being little began to change the way people thought, made them hate everyone not just like themselves. Da said they were “conditioned” to have the ideas that those who were in power wanted them to have—like being a Little was the right way to live and being a Natural was like being a killer or a robber or something. Da said people had worked and fought and even died to let everyone have an equal chance in life, and now the Littles were starting the old, bad ways of thinking, all over again—only this time they were even worse.

That's why he held on to the old books and made us learn all about what had happened, so we could tell our children—
though we probably wouldn't ever get to tell anyone anything now. I shivered as I bumped around in that truck, wondering what the Littles were going to do with us. They couldn't make us Littles, so what
did
they do with Nats when they caught them?

First they dumped us in a Nat pen. It was a big room, with walls like stone. Its small windows were so far up that there was no way to reach them. Along the walls were benches, squat and low, to match Littles and no one else. It smelled bad, as if people had been shut up there for a long time, and I guess people like us had been. To the Littles, of course, we weren't people—just things.

When the Littles brought us in, they had stunners out, and they yelled to the others to get away from the door or they would ray. They threw us on the floor, and then one sprayed the tangler cords so they began to dissolve. By the time I was free, the Littles were gone. I crawled over to Joboy. Crawl was all I could do, I had been tied up so long. Joboy was still sleeping. I sat beside him and looked at the others in the pen.

There were ten of them, all kids. A couple were just babies, and they were crying. The only one as old as me was a girl. She held one of the babies, trying to get it to suck a wet rag, but she looked over its head at me mighty sharp. There were two other girls. The rest were boys.

“Tam?” Joboy opened his eyes. “Tam!” He was scared.

“I'm here!” I put my hands on him so he'd know it was the truth. Joboy had a lot of bad dreams. Sometimes he woke up scared, and I had to make him sure I was right there.

“Tam, where are we?” He caught at one of my hands with both of his and held it fast.

One of the boys laughed. “Look around, kid, just look around.”

He was smaller than me, but now I saw he was older than I first thought. I didn't like his looks; he seemed too much like a Little.

He could be a “tweener.” Some of the Little kids were what they called “throwbacks.” They grew too big, so their people were ashamed and afraid of them and got rid of them. I guess they were afraid the tweeners might start everyone changing in size if they kept them around. The tweeners hated Nats, too—maybe even more, because they were something like them.

The girl with the baby spoke. “Shut up, Raul.” Then she asked me, “Kinfolk?”

“Brothers.” That Raul might be older, but I thought this girl was the head one there. “I'm Tam, and this is Joboy.”

She nodded. “I'm El-Su. She's Amay.” She motioned toward another girl, about Joboy's age, I reckoned, who had moved up beside her. “We're sisters. The rest. . ..” She said who they were, but I didn't try to remember their names. They were mostly just dirty faces and ragged clothes.

I ran my tongue over my lips, but before I could ask any questions, Joboy jerked at my hand. “Tam, I'm hungry. Please, Tam—”

“What about it?” I turned to El-Su. “Do we get fed?”

She pointed to the other wall. “Sure. They don't starve
us—at least, not yet. Go over there and press that red button. Be ready to catch what comes out, or it ends up on the floor.”

I did as she told me, and it was a good thing she had warned me. As it was, I nearly didn't catch the pot of stuff. I took it over to one of the benches, Joboy tailing me. There were no spoons, so we had to eat with our fingers. The food was stewed stuff that didn't taste like much of anything, but we were hungry enough to scrape it all out. While we ate, the rest stood around watching us, as if they had nothing else to do—which was the truth.

When I had finished, I tried El-Su again.

“So they feed us. What else do they do? What do they want us for?”

Raul moved in between us and answered first. “Make you work, big boy—really make you work. Bet they haven't had one as big as you for a long time.” He used the word “big” the way a Little does, meaning something nasty.

“Work how?” The Littles had machines to do their work, and those machines were made for Littles, not Nats, to run.

“You'll see—” Raul began, but El-Su, holding the baby, who had gone to sleep against her shoulder, reached out her other hand and gave him a push.

“He's asking me,
little
one.” Now she made “little” sound nasty, in return. “They indenture us,” she told me.

“Indenture?” That was a new word, and anything new, connected with Littles, could be bad. The sooner I knew how bad, the better.

She watched me closely, as if she thought I was pretending I didn't know what she meant.

“You never heard?”

I was short in answering. “If I had, would I be asking?”

“Right.” El-Su nodded. “You must have been picked up down south. Well, it's like this. The Littles, they're sending ships up in the sky—way off to the stars—”

“Moon walk!” One of Da's books had pictures about that.

“Farther out.” This El-Su spoke as if she had had old books to read, too. “Clear to another sun with a lot of worlds. To save space on the ship, they put most of the people to sleep—freeze them—until they get there.”

Maybe if I hadn't read that book of Da's, I would have thought she was making all this up out of her head, the way I made up the stories about Teddi for Joboy. But that moon book had some talk in it about star travel, also.

“The Littles found a world out there, like this one. But it's all wild—no cities, no roads, nothing—just lots of trees and country, where no one has ever been. They want to live there, but they can't take their digging and building machines along. Those are too heavy; besides, they'd take up too much room in the ship. So they want to take Nats—like us—to do the work. They get rid of grown-up Nats when they bring them here, but they aren't so afraid of kids. Maybe we're lucky.” El-Su didn't sound so sure about that, however.

“Yeah.” Raul pushed ahead of her again. “You got to work and do just what a Little tells you to. And you'll never get back
here, neither—not in your whole life! What do you think of that, big boy?”