The skeletons were imbedded in the wall.
They were mounted above the windwall gates in no particular pattern, one short of a dozen, half sunk in the seamless ullish metal and half exposed to the crossworlds wind. Some were in deeper than others. High up, the new skeleton of some nameless winged being rattled in the breeze, a loose bag of hollow fairy bones welded to the wall only at wrists and ankles. Yet lower, up and to the right a little from the doorway, the yellow barrel-stave ribs of a Linkellar were all that could be seen of the creature.
MacDonald's skeleton was half in, half out. Most of the limbs were sunk deep in the metal, but the fingertips dangled out (one hand still holding a laser), and the feet, and the torso was open to the air. And the skull, of course--bleached white, half crushed, but still a rebuke. It looked down at Holt every dawn as he passed through the portal below. Sometimes, in the curious half-light of an early crossworlds morning, it seemed as though the missing eyes followed him on his long walk toward the gate.
But that had not bothered Holt for months. It had been different right after they had taken MacDonald, and his rotting body had suddenly appeared on the windwall, half joined to the metal. Holt could smell the stench then, and the corpse had been too recognizably Mac. Now it was just a skeleton, and that made it easier for Holt to forget.
On that anniversary morning, the day that marked the end of the first full standard year since the Pegasus had set down, Holt passed below the skeletons with hardly an upward glance.
Inside, as always, the corridor stood deserted. It curved away in both directions, white, dusty, very vacant; thin blue doors stood at regular intervals, but all of them were closed.
Holt turned to the right and tried the first door, pressing his palm to the entry plate. Nothing; the office was locked. He tried the next, with the same result. And then the next. Holt was methodical. He had to be. Each day only one office was open, and each day it was a different one.
The seventh door slid open at his touch.
Behind a curving metal desk a single Dan'la sat, looking out of place. The room, the furniture, the field--everything had been built to the proportions of the long-departed ul-nayileith, and the Dan'la was entirely too small for its setting. But Holt had gotten used to it. He had come every day for a year now, and every day a single Dan'la sat behind a desk. He had no idea whether it was the same one changing offices daily, or a different one each day. All of them had long snouts and darting eyes and bristling reddish fur. The humans called them foxmen. With rare exceptions, Holt could not tell one from the other. The Dan'lai would not help him. They refused to give names, and the creature behind the desk sometimes recognized him, often did not. Holt had long since given up the game, and resigned himself to treating every Dan'la as a stranger.
This morning, though, the foxman knew him at once. "Ah," he said as Holt entered. "A berth for you?"
"Yes," Holt said. He removed the battered ship's cap that matched his frayed gray uniform, and he waited--a thin, pale man with receding brown hair and a stubborn chin.
The foxman interlocked slim, six-fingered hands and smiled a swift thin smile. "No berth, Holt," he said. "Sorry. No ship today."
"I heard a ship last night," Holt said. "I could hear it all the way over in the stone city. Get me a berth on it. I'm qualified. I know standard drive, and I can run a Dan'lai jump-gun. I have credentials."
"Yes, yes." Again the snapping smile. "But there is no ship. Next week, perhaps. Next week perhaps a man-ship will come. Then you'll have a berth, Holt, I swear it, I promise you. You a good jump man, right? You tell me. I get you a berth. But next week, next week. No ship now."
Holt bit his lip and leaned forward, spreading his hands on the desktop, the cap crushed beneath one fist. "Next week you won't be here," he said. "Or if you are, you won't recognize me, won't remember anything you promised. Get me a berth on the ship that came last night."
"Ah," said the Dan'la. "No berth. Not a man-ship, Holt. No berth for a man."
"I don't care. I'll take any ship. I'll work with Dan'lai, ullies, Cedrans, anything. Jumps are all the same. Get me on the ship that came in last night."
"But there was no ship, Holt," the foxman said. His teeth flashed, then were gone again. "I tell you, Holt. No ship, no ship. Next week, come back. Come back, next week." There was dismissal in his tone. Holt had learned to recognize it. Once, months ago, he'd stayed and tried to argue. But the desk-fox had summoned others to drag him away. For a week afterward, all the doors had been locked in the mornings. Now Holt knew when to leave.
Outside in the wan light, he leaned briefly against the windwall and tried to still his shaking hands. He must keep busy, he reminded himself. He needed money, food tokens, so that was one task he could set to. He could visit the Shed, maybe look up Sunderland. As for a berth, there was always tomorrow. He had to be patient.
With a brief glance up at MacDonald, who had not been patient, Holt went off down the vacant streets of the city of the shipless.
)
The human crew of the faster-than-light ship Pegasus are on an exploratory mission to the galactic core when they are stranded at the edge of the manrealm, their ship confiscated by the fox-like Dun'lai ... one of the many bizarre alien species dwelling on the desert planet Grayrest. The desolate world is the rumored home of an ancient alien civilization, their legacy being an immense abandoned city of stone. After a year of hardship and tragedy, only two members of the Pegasus crew have not given up hope, and are convinced that the Dun'lai will release their ship, or get them a berth in another ship ... any ship will do ... in exchange for a map of the Stone City. But neither are willing to descend into the underlayers of the city, where the captain went exploring and never came back.
