"I didn't see. He yelled and disappeared. Jayan snatched up a harpoon and ducked through and saw people disappearing deeper in. She's trailing a line. Gavving, should we stop her? They'll trap her too."

Why did it all have to happen at once? Clave's leg, the kidnappers, the moving box-"Okay. The soldiers on the box would be fools to come in here. It's the natives' territory-"

"We're here."

"We're more desperate . . . never mind, you're right. We go after Jayan right now, because it gets us away from that starstuff relic. Mernil

-" Would Merril slow them down? Probably not, in free-fall. Okay.

"Merril, me, Minya. We'll follow Jayan and see what's going on. Maybe we can bust the Grad loose. Jinny, you and Alfin follow as fast as you can, with dave. Merril, where's Jayan's line?"

"Somewhere over there. Treefodder, why does it all have to happen at once?"

"Yeah

Chapter Twelve - The Copsik Runners

Buws WERE RAISING AN INCREDIBLE RUCKUS. UNSEEN HANDS

pulled the Grad headfirst through darkness and the rich smell of alien foliage. Branchlets no longer scratched his face; there must be open space around him.

He'd had no warning at all. Hands had grasped his ankles and pulled him down into another world. His yell was strangled by something stuffed into his mouth, something that wasn't clean, and a rag was tied to hold it in. A blow on the head convinced him not to struggle.

His eyes were beginning to adjust to the gloom.

A tunnel wound through the foliage. It was narrow: big enough for two to crawl side by side, not big enough to walk in. No need, the Grad thought. You couldn't walk with no tide.

His captors were human, roughly speaking.

They were all women, though this needed a second glance. They wore leather vests and trousers, dyed green. The looseness of the vests

was their only concession to breasts. Three of the five wore their hair very short, and they all had a gaunt, stretched-out look: two and a half to three meters, taller than any of Quinn Tribe's men.

They held implements: small wooden bows on wooden platforms, the bowstrings pulled back, ready to fire.

They were making good time. The tunnel turned and twisted until the Grad was entirely disoriented. His directional senses wouldn't give him an up. It presently opened into a bulb-shape four or five meters across, with three other tunnels leading off. Here the women stopped. One pulled the rag out of his mouth. He spit to the side and said, "Treefodder!"

A woman spoke. Her skin was dark, her hair a compact black storm cloud threaded with white lightning. Her pronunciation was strange, worse than Minya's. "Why did you attack us?"

The Grad shouted in her face. "Stupid! We saw your attackers. They've got a traveling box made of starstuff. That's science! We got here on a sheet of bark!"