Cat Karina Read Online Free PDF Page B

“El Tigre. The jaguar.”
    “That’s different!” roared El Tigre, aware that he was losing his audience. “Listen to me! While we’re arguing trivialities the True Humans are massing to attack!”
    “Attack?”
    “Yes, attack! And what better time than the Tortuga Festival, when our women are drunk and copulating and unable to fight!” Now he had their attention again. He continued in tones of quiet menace. “In the delta the True Humans are constructing sailcars. But this is not the usual spate of building we see before the Festival, when the Cantons and the Companies compete to supply their captains with the biggest and swiftest cars. That’s happening as well, of course. The tortuga loading yard is buzzing with True Humans and their apish carpenters. It’s no secret.
    “But deep in the mangroves of the delta they’re building a different type of car — lighter and carrying more sail than anything we’ve ever seen. The first of this new breed has already been tested. My spy tells me it flew down the rails like the wind itself. He said he’d never seen such speed — and mark this, my friends. He said the car was virtually soundless. It flitted past him like a white ghost. It was a moonlit night, and he got a good look at the captain and crew. The captain was Tonio. The name of the car is Rayo  — the Thunderbolt!”
    Now Arrojo spoke excitedly. “Let’s send the grupos in! I can raise three — that’s fourteen women — for this kind of fight. It’s a time for cooperation!”
    “It’s too late tonight,” said Diferir. “The grupos are scattered all over the place. Anyway, a thing like this needs careful planning. We must define our objectives: what, after all, are we trying to achieve?”
    “I may be stupid,” said Torpe, a lolling felino, slow of speech, whose mouth tended to gape like a yawning llama and who was, in fact, stupid, “but surely El Tigre made it plain that our objective is the destruction of this Rayo .”
    “But I’m not stupid.” The voice came from the doorway and El Tigre groaned. It was Dozo, who’d been unable to follow through with his grand exit and who’d hovered about outside, listening. “And I need to know a bit more. What exactly is the threat in this Rayo , El Tigre? Why do you say the humans are massing to attack? Surely the Rayo — if it exists — is just one more fast car. If it’s faster than the others, this means Captain Tonio will reach the southern markets before the other cars, and will get the best prices for his tortugas, and earn a bonus. And since he’s employed by Rangua Canton, the Lord will profit too. It’s an affair of True Humans. Why should we care?”
    “Because Rayo can travel faster than a man on galloping horseback,” said El Tigre quietly. “Just think about that for a moment, Dozo.”
    And Dozo said, “Oh.”
    The others, standing and sitting around in the darkened hut, chewed this over. Nobody spoke. In a short while, even Torpe had worked out the significance of the True Humans’ technological advance.…
    “So now,” said El Tigre heavily, rubbing it in, “a car full of soldiers can be transported anywhere on the coast before warning of its approach can be given. We would know nothing until the car appeared and unloaded. All our work — the scouting system we’ve built up over the years — will be useless.”
    “But the Signalmen …?”
    “They’ve never been on our side. Don’t kid yourself.”
    “But we are not at war,” said Diferir mildly.
    “We’ve always been at war. Ever since the great Mordecai created the first Specialist, we’ve been at war with the True Humans.”
    “This is quite a moment in history,” said Dozo in calm tones. “Do you realize, it’s probably thousands of years since humans have been able to travel faster than a galloping horse? I’d hate to think that war was the only purpose of this step forward. Perhaps we should make sure of our facts before we do anything