Voodoo Planet by Andre Norton (big ebook reader txt) 📕

of the terrace, it flung up its head as if to challenge. But words issued from between those curved fangs, words which Dane might not understand but which undoubtedly held meaning for the men nodding in time to the hypnotic cadence of that da⁠—da⁠—da.⁠ ⁠…

“Beautiful!” Tau spoke in honest admiration, his own eyes almost as feral as those of the talking beast as he leaned forward, his fists on his knees.

Now the animal was dancing also, its paws following the pace set by the masked attendants. It must be a man in an animal skin. But Dane could hardly believe that. The illusion was too perfect. His own hands went to the knife sheath at his belt. Out of deference to local custom they had left their stun rods in the palace, but a belt knife was an accepted article of apparel. Dane slid the blade out surreptitiously, setting its point against the palm of his hand and jabbing painfully. This was another of Tau’s answers for breaking a spell. But the white and black creature continued to dance; there was no blurring of its body lines into those of a human being.

It sang on in a high-pitched voice, and Dane noted that those of the audience nearest the stools where Asaki and the captain were seated now watched the Chief Ranger and the space officer. He felt Tau tense beside him.

“Trouble coming.⁠ ⁠…” The warning from Tau was the merest thread of sound. Dane forced himself to look away from the swaying cat-dog, to watch instead the singers who were now furtively eying their lord and his guest. The Terran knew that there were feudal bonds between the Ranger and his men. But suppose this was a showdown between Lumbrilo and Asaki⁠—whose side would these men take?

He watched Captain Jellico’s hand slide across his knee, his fingers drop in touching distance of knife hilt. And the hand of the Chief Ranger, hanging lax at his side, suddenly balled into a fist.

“So!” Tau expelled the word as a hiss. He moved with surefooted speed. Now he passed between the stools to confront the dancing cat-dog. Yet he did not look at that weird creature and its attendants. Instead his arms were flung high as if to ward off⁠—or perhaps welcome⁠—something on the mountain side as he shouted:

“Hodi, eldama! Hodi!”

As one, those on the terrace turned, looked up toward the slope. Dane was on his feet, holding his knife as he might a sword. Though of what use its puny length would be against that huge bulk moving in slow majesty toward them, he did not try to think.

Gray-dark trunk curled upward between great ivory tusks, ears went wide as ponderous feet crunched volcanic soil. Tau moved forward, his hands still upraised, clearly in greeting. That trunk touched skyward as if in salute to the man who could be crushed under one foot.

“Hodi, eldama!” For the second time Tau hailed the monster elephant and the trunk raised in silent greeting from one lord of an earth to another he recognized as an equal. Perhaps it had been a thousand years since man and elephant had stood so, and then there had been only war and death between them. Now there was peace and a current of power flowing from one to the other. Dane sensed this, saw the men on the terrace likewise drawing back from the unseen tie between the medic and the bull he had so clearly summoned.

Then Tau’s upheld hands came together in a sharp clap and men held their breath in wonder. Where the great bull had stood there was nothing⁠—except rocks in the sun.

As Tau swung around to face the cat-dog, that creature had no substance either. For he fronted no animal but a man, a small, lean man whose lips wrinkled back from his teeth in a snarl. His attendant priests fell back, leaving the spaceman and the witch doctor alone.

“Lumbrilo’s magic is great,” Tau said evenly. “I hail Lumbrilo of Khatka.” His hand made the open-palmed salute of peace.

The snarl faded as the man brought his face under control. He stood naked, but he was clothed in inherit dignity. And there was power with that dignity, power and a pride before which even the more physically impressive Chief Ranger might have to give place.

“You have magic also, outlander,” he replied. “Where walks this long-toothed shadow of yours now?”

“Where once the men of Khatka walked, Lumbrilo. For it was men of your blood who long, long past hunted this shadow of mine and made its body their prey.”

“So that it now might have a blood debt to settle with us, outlander?”

“That you said, not I, man of power. You have shown us one beast, I have shown another. Who can say which of them is stronger when it issues forth from the shadows?”

Lumbrilo pattered forward, his bare feet making little sound on the stones of the terrace. Now he was only an arm’s-length away from the medic.

“You have challenged me, off-world man.” Was that a question or a statement? Dane wondered.

“Why should I challenge you, Lumbrilo? To each race its own magic. I come not to offer battle.” His eyes held steady with the Khatkan’s.

“You have challenged me.” Lumbrilo turned away and then looked back over his shoulder. “The strength you depend upon may become a broken staff, off-worlder. Remember my words in the time when shadows become substance, and substance the thinnest of shadows!”

III

“You are truly a man of power!”

Tau shook his head in answer to that outburst from Asaki.

“Not so, sir. Your Lumbrilo is a man of power. I drew upon his power and you saw the results.”

“Deny it not! What we saw never walked this world.”

Tau slung the strap of a trail bag over his shoulder. “Sir, once men of your blood, men who bred your race, hunted the elephant. They took his tusks for their treasure, feasted upon his flesh⁠—yes, and died beneath