Beast Master's Planet: Omnibus of Beast Master and Lord of Thunder (Beastmaster) Read Online Free PDF Page B

bird-trill and glanced up to meet the astonished yellow eyes of the Norbie, their vertical pupils expanding visibly. The native spoke again in his thin, sharp twitter, a surprising sound to come from the throat of that large body as his fingers flicked a question at Dort.
    “Call in that eagle of yours, too, if you can, Storm. You’re makin’ a big impression and that can be good for us—”
    The Terran scratched Surra under the jaw and behind the ears and then stood up. Spreading his feet a little apart and tensing his shoulder for the shock of Baku’s landing weight, he whistled.
    Wide wings beat the air as Baku dropped in a series of spectacular turns. But when those powerful talons gripped Storm’s shoulder they did not pierce flesh. Under the merciless beams of the Arzor noon sun the blue-black plumage had a metallic sheen, and the patch of bright yellow feathers about the cruel blue-gray curve of the beak stood out as if freshly daubed with paint.
    “Saaaa—” The Terran’s warning alerted both cat and bird. Feathered head and furred one moved to his signal, and two pairs of predatory, glittering eyes regarded the Norbie with intelligent interest.
    “That’s done it!” Dort was relieved. “But keep ’em under control when we go into the camp.”
    Storm nodded, staring at the spot where the native had stood only seconds earlier. The Terran prided himself on his own scoutcraft and ability to become a part of the landscape, but this Norbie was better than the best he had ever seen.
    “Camp’s down on the river bank.” Dort came out of the saddle. “We walk in. Also—” He drew his stun rod from its holster and firedthe ready charge into the air. “You don’t enter with a loaded rod, it’s not considered manners—”
    Once more Storm followed the settler’s direction. Baku took off into the sky and Surra paced a yard or so before them, the tip of her tail twitching now and then to betray her interest in her surroundings. There was the scent of strange cooking and stranger living smells, as well as small sounds, coming up slope.
    A Norbie camp was not pitched on formal lines. Lengths of kalma wood, easily shaped when wet and iron stiff when dried, had been bent by each householder to form the framework for a hemisphere tent. The hides stretched over that frame were piebald mixtures patched together from the fruits of the individual family’s hunting. Blues of frawn pelts were joined by clever lacing to the silver-yellow scales of young yoris skins, banded in turn with the red fur of river rodents. The largest tent had a complete border about its base and door flap of jewel-bright bird skins set in a pattern of vivid color.
    Storm could see no women as they came down to the cluster of tents. But before each of the dwellings stood Norbie males, young and old, each armed. The scout who had met them on the trail was waiting at the flap of the bird-trimmed lodge.
    As if unaware of the silent audience, the off-world men threaded their way to that tent and Dort halted before the chieftain. Storm stood quietly a little behind him, allowing none of his interest in his surroundings to show. Silently he counted some twenty of the rounded tents, and he knew that each housed a full family, which could number up to fifteen or more natives, since a man married into his wife’s clan and joined her family as a younger son until the number of his children increased to make him the head of his own family. Judging by Norbie standards this was a town of some size—of the zamle totem—for a stylized representation of that bird of prey was painted on the name shield before the chieftain’s lodge.
    “Storm”—Dort spoke softly as his hand signed a greeting to the impassive natives—“call in that bird of yours again. These are—”
    “Zamle clansmen,” the Terran nodded. “So they’ll be favorably impressed by
my
bird totem?” Again he whistled to summon Baku, bracing himself for the bird’s landing. But