Free The Early Pohl by Frederik Pohl

in my ear. She was obviously being as brave as she knew how. I didn't have to tell her that we were in serious trouble. Maybe if her own father hadn't been dead, killed in a raid while unsuccessfully trying to protect her mother, she would have made a fuss about going away with me. But the only person she was really close to in the Blues was myself. She trusted me, and that was a powerful incentive, because her own life might not be entirely safe if we were captured.
    I could hear them shouting back in the clearing, howling for my blood. Then Corlos's bullish yowl sounded over the others; I couldn't make out what he said, but it seemed to quiet them.
    I set Clory down on the ground and led her along. It was growing late. If the warriors were to raid the Red-and-Brown tribe this night, they must leave soon, too soon to try to capture us—until they returned. That gave us a certain period of grace.
    We stood statue-still for a second, listening for sounds of pursuit. There weren't any. Apparently the Tribe had decided to let our punishment wait until the raid had been completed, for I could hear the chant of the warriors resume their deep-voiced promises of catastrophe to the Enemy tribe.
    Distantly Corlos's yowl came to me. "So burns the Enemy!" he shouted, over the thin pounding of the drums. "So dies their tribe! Burn, Red-and-Browns! Burn with the House of the Enemy!" And there was a blood-freezing screech from fifty throats, as the warriors echoed, "Burn!"
    Then the drums rolled up to a bleak crescendo and stopped. I wondered what they had substituted for us in the House of the Enemy. Lurlan's corpse, probably. Well, better than his living body, or ours. I strained my eyes in the direction of the village, and saw the trees weirdly black and orange in the flickering of the burning shack. Then the cries died down and there was no sound we could hear, for a long time.
     
     
     
    2
The Glider
     
    I woke up with a start and clutched at my bow. Some sound had awakened me. Voices!
    We had slept for hours, much longer than I'd intended. As I looked at Clory I realized that, for there was light to see her sleeping form. Dawn was near.
    I rose cautiously without waking her, and peered around for the source of the voices. It was a party of warriors swinging along the trail, not twenty feet away.
    Were they pursuing us? I saw they were not. They were pilots, the men who, secure in the speed of our gliders, would fly over the village we were to raid, shooting into the forces of the enemy, dropping blazing torches if they could, causing disorder in a hundred ways. They were on their way to the hill where our gliders were kept, there to launch them and be on their way to the enemy town.
    I knew how to pilot a glider, that was one of the things for which I had been indebted to Lurlan. If we could steal one of those ships . . .
    The men had passed out of hearing. Quickly I woke Clory and explained to her what I had seen, and the plan I'd made. Most wonderful of seven-year-old girls that she was, she understood immediately and followed me cautiously through the underbrush to the clearing where stood the catapults for the gliders.
    We were noiseless—literally—as we wormed our way towards the clearing. We moved slowly, and as we approached we heard the dull "dwang-g-g-g" of the released catapult as the first glider took to the air. We hid under a tree as it soared down the slope of the hill to gain speed, directly overhead. Luckily, the initial effort to gain altitude made it necessary for the pilots to cover a good deal of territory; they couldn't, therefore, wait for each other and proceed to the enemy village en masse . If they had, our hopes of escape would have been ruined, for we would have been spotted immediately, and shot down.
    I've never stalked an Eater as soundlessly as I led Clory, crawling, to the catapults. The sky was already showing color, and the ground was wet with pre-dawn mist. I heard the catapult drone its