Don’t Bite the Sun by Tanith Lee (little red riding hood ebook free .TXT) 📕

her trying to coax him off to some cave or other, when all he wanted to do was tell her about this terribly old tribe who used to eat each other, ceremoniously, of course, when the ponka herds got low.

“Now that we’ve made a start,” he deigned to say to me as we ate third meal, “we’ll find all sorts of levels under the site, I’ve no doubt. Weapon rooms, for example.”

Oh, it really could have been interesting.

Well, it could.

I mean, I’ve got this thing about ruins and citadels and weapons and dragons and exotic intrigues and so on. But Assule soon made it seem as though we were listening to him reprogramming one of his floating floors or something.

Anyhow, the machines went on digging and churning and crashing, and found absolutely nothing at all. Once there was this boom, and we rushed off to see what it was, but it was just some power charge or other exploding.

I began to feel claustrophobic about the site and wanted to rush out into the desert and roll around like the pet kept doing, but I felt a bit agoraphobic too, so didn’t. I actually thought the pet might run off and leave me for its native element, but it always came back. I got used to seeing it scampering across the rock fells and dunes, mottled with loose grains, sneezing and honking happily and then leaping into my arms and scattering sand in every direction.

Things were tense now. It wasn’t our silly insignificant tenseness, either, it was sand tenseness and mountain-and-sky tenseness. Assule informed us that it was the desert waiting for the rain. He felt it too, you see, but the females didn’t. They looked blank and sort of: Oh, well, you have to put up with these terribly attractive males who go batty now and then.

Another plane came out with supplies, and one of the females actually gave in and elected to go home on it. The other two glared at each other to see who would be next. A little later one of them, the more typical of the two, took me aside among the rocks.

“You know, dear,” she tweeted, “I really can’t understand what a little Jang girl like you sees out here to make her stay.”

“Oh, it’s Assule,” I said.

“Assule?” she queried, shocked.

“Oh yes.” I smiled. “I know he couldn’t go on without me.”

“Well!” she started.

“Oh, it may sound vain, I know,” I said, sweet and sorrowing, “but when you’ve known him as long as I have…”

“Known him as long as—?”

“Shared his ups and downs …”

“Ups and downs—?”

“Been his support and comforter in times of stress …”

“Comforter—?”

“You realize that he needs you, really needs you, just for the odd word of encouragement, you know, just the occasional warm embrace,” I finished up, watching her control her impending hysteria.

“He’s your maker,” she suddenly accused, seeking a reasonable explanation and a way around what I’d said.

I looked affronted.

“Certainly not,” I snapped.

Poor woman. She went white around the nose and her eyes gave off sparks as I strolled away.

It was a bit of a nuisance, though. I had been toying with the idea of going home and now I’d have to stick it out to the bitter end. Couldn’t have Glar Assule prancing around, all happiness and joy, without his little support and comforter, could I?

But the desert was making me feel really strange. I kept on having dreams about being a desert woman, in an oosha and long dark veil, trucking across the wastes, by burning day and black night, the odd volcano my scarlet lamp. Sometimes I had this child with me, pale-faced and anxious.

“Maker,” it kept saying, “where’s the next watering place?” And I knew it would die on me if we didn’t get to one quickly, and I didn’t know where the watering place was or even how to recognize it. And then the dream would sort of slip and we’d both be lying there flat out, our faces in the sand, with this huge orange fire ringing around the sky above us and a voice pounding and pounding out:

“Don’t bite the sun. Don’t bite the sun.”

And then the site was invaded.

Oh, it could have been a laugh, really, if any of us had had a shred of humor left that morning.

There we were at first meal on the rock, Assule, the two females, who now studiously avoided me, myself, and the pet. I looked up from a plate of fried root-bread and honey, and what should I see, ho-ho, but this tawny, furry face staring at me from around a rock. The pet barked. Yes, it was one of those again, the long-eared purposeful ones with ski-feet. It flipped these ears around, twitched its antennae, and sort of went “Fpmf” down its nose.

“Assule, what’s that?” I started to ask, when suddenly they were on us. I suppose it was the smell of cooked food that brought them. They’d probably been traveling for units across the sand, following their furry noses. The females screamed as great elongated feet came down splat in the root-bread and tawny paws flailed among the opal-wine.

“Are they dangerous?” I tried to ask Assule, while I attempted not to be trampled into the honey.

“Come on!” Assule yelled, and we rushed out of it and back to the sand-ship, leaving the rugs, the meal, the machines, everything, at the mercy of those great feet and ridiculous ears.

We staggered into the T. Tower, turned on Zoom Scanners, and stared. We had a perfect view of the citadel foundations positively dripping furry bodies. They were devouring the food, slurping up the wine, and going “Fpmf!” all over the place. Pretty soon they began to eat the rugs, spreading honey on them first, I might add.

“I just hope they don’t get at the machines,” Assule just hoped, but they did.

They were really very intelligent, in a zaradann sort of way. They had a lovely time finding out how everything worked, then dismantling it. They rode