Dalgard had no idea as yet how he could win back across the waste of
water to his own people. While the mermen with whom he had stormed the
city were friendly, they were not of the tribes he knew, and their own
connection with the eastern continent was through messages passed
between islands and the depths.
Then there was the stranger--Dalgard knew that the ship which had
brought him to this planet was somewhere in the north. Perhaps when he
recovered, they could travel in that direction. But for the moment it
was good just to be free, to feel the soft winds of summer lick his
skin, to walk slowly under the sun, carrying the little bundle of
things which belonged to the stranger, with a knife once more at his
belt and friends about him.
But within the quarter-hour their peace was broken. Dalgard heard it
first, his landsman's ears serving him where the complicated sense
which gave the sea people warning did not operate. That shrill
keening--he knew it of old. And at his warning the majority of the
mermen plunged into the stream, becoming drifting shadows below the
surface of the water.
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