Ancestor's World Read Free Page B

quivered the ground beneath him, and he steadied himself on his tail. The beam of the light-globe he was carrying swung a little, then steadied as the tremor eased away. Water sloshed in the canteen slung over his shoulder.
    Blinking deep black eyes, Beloran looked beyond them at the holed-through tomb wall, then glared at Gordon. "You broke through," he said in sibilant High Na-Dina. Gordon heard the translation via his voder earcuff. "Why did you not call me? I should have been present."
    Gordon stood up, brushed dust off his coveralls, and shrugged. "I tried to," he lied. "The com signal must have been blocked by the rock." Running his tongue over cracked lips, he stretched out a hand. "Hey, thanks for bringing water."
    "Blocked?" Absently, the Na-Dina handed him the canteen, then squatted down to peer into the hole. The symbols painted on his left shoulder gleamed in the light from the globe.
    The colorful glyphs denoted personal name, trade, parental status, job title and family clan, including whether the alien was related to the Royal House.
    Beloran wasn't. Maybe that's why he'd ended up in commerce, as a Merchant.
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    Until recently, earning one's living by buying and selling was considered demeaning as a profession. But the First Contact had changed all that.
    The shock of learning that aliens existed, and the necessity of finding a place for the Na-Dina people in a strange new universe, coupled with the practical necessity of finding goods to trade, had elevated the Merchant profession almost to the status of nobility.
    Beloran let out a long hiss of mingled wonder and dismay. "It's intact!" he exclaimed a moment later. "The tomb of A-Um Rakt is intact!" On the alien's back, overlapping folds of scaly flesh quivered like jowls. His long tail thumped the dusty tunnel floor.
    "Yes, it is," Khuharkk' said. "We are very fortunate!"
    "Treasure ..." Beloran added, as if he hadn't heard the Simiu. The Liaison sighed, sounding almost regretful. "This will delay the rising of the dam, will it not?"
    "Possibly," Gordon said. Then he added, in a burst of honesty, "Probably.
    But, Beloran--look! That's your heritage, and it's wonderful? And also ... there are Mizari artifacts there, at the foot of the sarcophagus. Your people may well have been the last species to have contact with the Lost Colony! That's a momentous discovery!"
    "Mizari?" Beloran jerked his head out of the hole so fast that he banged it on the stone. The Liaison glared at them, obviously furious, his tail stiff with anger. "Are you saying that infidel outworlders were responsible for A-Um Rakt's glorious reign?"
    "No!" Gordon protested. "Of course not! I'm saying that your God-King was so great that even aliens from another world wanted to pay homage to him, and left grave- gifts!"
    "Ahhhh ... Yesss ... I can see that," Beloran said quietly, after a moment.
    "When you explain it that way, it makes sense."
    The Na-Dina's tail relaxed visibly. "But, Doctor Mitchell, my job is to look out for the welfare of my people, and it is difficult to see how this discovery, marvelous as it is, will make up for the delay in the building of the dam that 12
    will bring us so many benefits." The Liaison straightened back up. He did not look Gordon straight in the eye, but that was not the Na-Dina way, so the archaeologist was not surprised. "However, I suppose congratulations are in order, Doctor Mitchell."
    "Thank you, Beloran," Gordon said, matching the other's grave mien.
    "Since you have already gone ahead and opened the wall, without my presence, I suppose the saying of the sacred words can be delayed a bit longer," Beloran said, his hissing voice punctuated with glottal clicks.
    "Do your legends or records contain anything about the visit from the Mizari six thousand years ago?" Gordon asked eagerly. The Na-Dina were very protective of their records, and no outworlder had ever seen them.
    The alien folded his blue-scaled forearms, mantislike, and bobbed his head to