Part 2

Cosmo felt his palms dampen. The terrific gravity of Jupiter endowed the Jovian primitives with superhuman strength. Normally, they were docile creatures and highly prized among the Venusians as slaves because of their terrible strength and weird beauty. The Dawn Man faced them now, nostrils flaring as he tested their scent. He was handsome as a matinee idol. But somewhere the Jovians had run into an evolutionary blind pocket. They would never evolve into true men. They were animals.

Cosmo scarcely noted the third member of the group, the short barrel-shaped Mercurian. He stood a little apart, smiling blandly and quietly like an inscrutable Buddha.

"Look at the scars on their shoulders," Mia whispered hoarsely. "The fern leaf! That's Bemmelman's brand. They're the runaways!"

The Venusian raised his rifle. His green eyes burned with hate for the Earthlings.

Mia shrank toward Cosmo. "He--he's...."

"Put down your rifle," said Cosmo in the Venusian dialect of Mu. He could feel the pulse beat in his ears; his lips felt dry. "Seek you the Renegade?"

The Venusian hesitated, indecision reflected in his dark-yellow features. The Dawn Man shook his club, growled deep in his chest. Muscles rippled like hawsers beneath his blue hide.

"Most certainly." It was the Mercurian who spoke.

Cosmo glanced at him sharply, realized that behind the Mercurian's smiling mask, he was violently distressed. Mercurians didn't approve of bloodshed, he recalled.

Sweat dappled Cosmo's forehead. Then, with a faint shrug, he made a peculiar gesture with his hand.

An expression of wonder and comprehension filled their faces. Only the blue giant continued to rumble deep in his chest.

"The Renegade!" cried the fat Mercurian, and his yellow eyes twinkled with relief. He plumped on his knees, repeated the cabalistic symbol.

With only a moment's hesitation the serf followed suit. "Down, you big ox!" he shouted at the Jovian and thwacked him behind the knees with his ray rifle. "Down! That's the Renegade!"

III

Mia MacIver stared at Cosmo in disbelief. "You--you're not the Renegade! I don't believe it."

"It's lucky for you, I am," he said dryly.

She held her hands straight down at her side, small fists clenched. "Lucky? Father thought you were his friend and you killed him. I'd rather be dead than owe you anything."

"Listen, Mia, get this straight. I didn't kill your father."

"Of course, you'd say that." Her chin trembled; she set her jaw stubbornly. "Who'd believe the Renegade?"

Cosmo made a weary gesture, turned back to the runaways who'd been listening with interest.

"Get off your knees," he said. His tone was embarrassed. "The Security Patrol is scouring the countryside for you right now. Take to the forest where the planes can't follow. Make for the mountains. My men...."

"By Nemi!" the Buddha-faced Mercurian ejaculated suddenly. He pointed at Mia who was slipping through the window to her study. "The girl is escaping. After her, Tong!"

The Venusian serf leaped in pursuit, but Cosmo halted him with a lifted hand. "She won't go far." He turned back to the Mercurian. "I give the orders," he said.

The moon-faced little man bowed good-naturedly. Cosmo realized he wasn't even armed.

"What are you doing with this pair of cut-throats?" he asked.

"We understand one another," the Mercurian replied blandly. "I act as a governor. My presence restrains them from indulging in an excess of blood letting."

"Who sent you to me?" Cosmo asked shrewdly. "Was it Penang-ihtok?"

The Mercurian shuddered. "Yes. A violent man, that Penang-ihtok. An outcast Fozoql."

"He's safe then?" Cosmo interrupted. "Bemmelman doesn't suspect him?"

"No."

"Good." He frowned, said: "Go now. Your time is short."

Without a word the odd trio filed off. Cosmo watched them around the corner of the plantation house, then sprang through the window of Mia's study.

The girl was at the telecast. She had tuned in the fat Commissioner of the Security Patrol.

"What?" the Commissioner's voice rumbled from the audio. His jowls were shaking; his image wildly agitated. "Are you sure, Owner MacIver? The Renegade at your plantation with the serfs from the Bemmelman place?"

Without waiting for an answer, he turned away from the Visoscreen, but Cosmo could still hear his voice shouting orders at some underling.

"Contact the radio patrol planes! Order them to converge on the MacIver plantation! The Renegade! Good Lord, man, d'ya realize what a feather it'll be in our caps? Hurry!"

The fat Commissioner swung back into the visoscreen. "I'll have a dozen patrol planes there in ten minutes. What does he look like, Owner MacIver? Who is he?"

"He is ..." began Mia, then discovered Cosmo standing beside the boxlike transmitter on the wall. He flashed her a faintly wolfish grin.

* * * * *

Mia gasped, brought her hand to her throat. Her high firm breasts heaved wildly beneath the yellow tunic.

"What's wrong, Owner MacIver? What's wrong?" came the excited voice from the audio.

Mia's wide gray eyes brimmed with hate.

"He is ..." she began again, but the screen went dead. Cosmo had yanked the transmitter from the wall. Wires like tentacles dangled from the back of the box. He dropped it to the gray straw matting.

"That won't help!" Mia's voice was triumphant as she backed away. "You can't escape. They'll come from all directions."

Again Cosmo grinned. He jumped, seized Mia, swung her off her feet.

"Let me go!"

"You're coming with me." His voice was grim. "I'd rather the Commissioner didn't find out I'm the Renegade just yet."

"Put me down! Are you mad?" Mia's long, bare legs thrashed wildly. She hammered at his chest. "You can't escape by yourself, let alone with me."

He calmly pinioned her flailing legs, strode out the window to the edge of the patio. Dropping her to her feet, he fumbled in his pocket, drew forth a whistle, put it to his lips, blew.

No audible sound resulted. The note was too high, too shrill to be detected by human ears.

Mia MacIver quit squirming, gaped at him blankly.

Cosmo's eyes searched the dense pearl gray cloud ceiling. He blew twice more on the soundless whistle.

There was a disturbance in the cloud layer directly overhead as if tremendous fans were boiling the impenetrable fleecy ceiling into a froth. Then a huge grotesque shape plummeted from the clouds. With back flailing wings, the monster settled to the ground.

Mia screamed, tried to squirm free.

"Let me go! Let me go!"

"It's just a bird," he assured her.

"Just a bird, hell!" Mia shuddered. "That thing's a nightmare. What is it?"

"An Ormoo."

The Ormoo cocked its red-brown eye at Cosmo, rubbed its gunmetal gray beak against his leg, emitted a pleased raucous squawk.

Mia flinched. The beak looked capable of severing Cosmo's leg like a twig. From wing tip to wing tip the Ormoo extended over sixty feet. Its pearl gray plumage was a perfect camouflage as it drifted through Venus' eternal cloud blanket.

"Down!" shouted Cosmo.

The Ormoo crouched to its breast like a hen setting on her eggs. A saddle was strapped to its back.

"Cosmo!" cried Mia in terror, struggling to wrench free.

The Ormoo cocked its head again, eyed the frantic girl gravely as a robin might watch a beetle.

"My God, Cosmo, that thing wants to eat me. I'll--I'll have hysterics."

He laughed, flung her astride the saddle. Holding onto her naked ankle, he vaulted up behind.

"Up!" he shouted.

The Ormoo lurched to its feet. It took a few ungainly steps, launched itself into the air with a powerful drive of its legs. The massive wings lashed the air like flails as it spiraled upward.

Mia clung to Cosmo with terror.

"Take me back, Cosmo. I won't tell the Commissioner you're the Renegade. I'll lie like a Martian diplomat. Only make this monstrosity go down! Please Cosmo!"

He put an arm about her waist, steadying her.

"Don't be frightened. He won't hurt you so long as I'm here."

"The hell you say," said Mia between chattering teeth. "I tell you that bird considers me in the same light as a juicy worm."

Already, the tenuous mist was closing around them. The Ormoo still spiraled upward. Cosmo saw a patrol flash by beneath them, pause like a humming bird over the patio. Another, then another streaked in from different directions.

Mia MacIver leaned over all at once, shrieked in a despairing voice: "Help! Help!"

"You little wretch," Cosmo grinned, clapped his hand over her mouth. She bit him.

He jerked his hand away. Before she could cry out again, the wool-like cloud blanket smothered them. Everything disappeared in moist white fleece. Mia slumped forlornly in Cosmo's powerful arm.

"Home," Cosmo shouted.

The giant bird wheeled off at an angle, wings beating with the rhythmic swish of waves lapping at a beach. Guided by some peculiar sixth sense, it headed by the shortest route for the Cloud Mountains.

For a while, the whish--swish of the Ormoo's wings was the only sound. It was like flying through a warm blinding blizzard.

"Does it know where it's going?" Mia twisted about in Cosmo's arm, curiosity overcoming her terror. Already her brown piquant features dripped with moisture. Her damp yellow tunic clung to her pliant figure like skin.

"Yes. The patrol planes can't navigate in these clouds. But the Ormoo can. It flys by instinct."

She relaxed, laid her damp black curls against his shoulder.

"Cosmo, why did you turn renegade?"

Her attitude had undergone such an about face that his green eyes hardened warily.

"It's a long story."

Mia snuggled deeper in his arms. "Was it because your father and mother were killed and Bemmelman stole your plantation?"

"That was part of it. My nurse fled with me to the Cloud Mountains. The Jovians trailed us, hunted us for months, then we fell in with a party of outlaws. They were rough men, but kind. I didn't understand much that was happening at the time, but later I managed to piece it together. I swore I'd make Bemmelman pay."

He laughed mirthlessly. "It was no use. The authorities weren't interested in hearing anything against him. I thought maybe if I could get concrete evidence, that would force them to act. I broke into his manor house. I was discovered, but I got away. I was wearing a hood to conceal my features. The newscasters played it up. The hooded man. The Renegade. I suddenly found myself notorious--an outlaw."

"But you raided other plantations. You stirred up the serfs!" She couldn't keep the edge of hate and accusation out of her voice.

"Some," he admitted with a grin, "though we preyed on other outlaws principally. But whenever the Security Patrol couldn't solve a crime, they laid it to the Renegade. The list is astounding: murder, rapine, theft." He chuckled grimly. "I've even been credited with committing two killings at the same time over five hundred miles apart."

"But even if you get Bemmelman," Mia pointed out; "what can you gain. You're still an outlaw. You'll be sent to the disintegration chamber."

"Oh, they'll get me someday," he replied coolly. "But first, I'll drag down Bemmelman."

* * * * *

The Ormoo flew steadily, strongly. Presently, the girl said:

"Does the Ormoo really understand your commands?"

"A few simple ones."

"Would it obey me?"

"Try it."

"Down," cried Mia.

The Ormoo plummeted toward the surface. Mia clapped her hands, shrieked: "Up!" Its wings thundered as it gained altitude again.

She twisted around in the saddle. "It obeys me," she laughed infectiously. She placed her hands, as if to steady herself on Cosmo's shoulder. All at once, her gray eyes contracted. She gave him a tremendous push.

Caught completely by surprise, Cosmo lunged desperately for the saddle, missed. He felt himself slipping faster and faster on the bird's wet back. There he went over with a rush.

His wildly grabbing hand slid down Mia's bare leg. Like a drowning man clutching at a straw, his fingers closed about her ankle.

Mia gave a shriek of terror, rolled over on her stomach, hugged the saddle.

"Let go!" she yelled. "You're pulling me off!" She kicked wildly at the man dangling pendulum-like from her foot.

Cosmo grunted. He pulled himself up, grabbed her leg just above the calf. Thrusting his free hand into the Ormoo's feathers, he seized a large quill, inched himself upward.

Mia was too busy hanging to the saddle to kick at him. She lay stomach down across the Ormoo's back clinging with the strength of panic.

Cosmo released her leg, got a grip on her tunic. It parted halfway up her back, leaving him dangling wildly from the huge quill. He caught her leg again, strained upward until he could grasp the saddle and heave himself astride.

He sat there, trembling with exhaustion, panting.

Mia still lay stomach down across the saddle sobbing with frustration. There were red finger weals on ankle, calf and thigh where Cosmo's iron fingers had dug into her flesh.

He flashed her his sudden grin. "You little devil," he panted. "I ought to dangle you over the Ormoo's side. See how you'd like it."

A shudder passed through the girl. "I hate you! I hate you!" she sobbed in frustrated rage.

There was a soothing tempo to the swish-lift of the giant Ormoo's flight. Mia dozed as the miles fled past, slumped against Cosmo's chest.

Then unexpectedly, the bird wheeled, flapped sharply upward. Its huge wing tips brushed the face of a cliff. Fog swirled, whipped into froth by the frenzied wings.

Mia MacIver awakened in terror, clung to Cosmo, pressed her damp quivering body against him. The bird wheeled again and again, always gaining altitude.

"We're in the Mountains of the Clouds." Cosmo's green eyes glittered. "We'll be at the roost any moment."

It was colder. Mia shivered. Then the Ormoo began to settle. Wings thrashing, it came to rest with a jar.

Nothing was visible but cloud, thick, clinging. The mountains, thrusting up into Venus' cloud sheath, were perpetually mantled with the gray vapor. The deep throated roar of a waterfall beat at their ears like thunder.

Cosmo slid off the Ormoo's back, shouted at Mia to jump. His voice was drowned in the waterfall. A dash of spray struck his face.

He felt for her ankle, yanked. She came tumbling into his arms with a scream. Cosmo laughed, bore her lightly across the jumble of sticks which was the Ormoo's nest, down a long slippery flight of steps descending into the chasm. Spray drenched them both. The roar was unbearable.

He paused, fumbled at a section of the cliff. A door swung inward, revealing a long low chamber hewn from the living rock.

Cosmo carried the wet and shivering girl across the threshold.

Fog swirled about them like steam from a turkish bath. He set her on her feet, shut the door. The roar of the waterfall was blotted out. Only the hissing of gas jets which lighted the chamber disturbed the silence.

"My private entrance." He surveyed his prize. The wet yellow tunic revealed every subtle curve. "You're a handsome wench, Mia."

Mia MacIver frowned. "Entrance to what?"

"The Renegade's abode. The mountain's honeycombed with caves. Come on."

But Mia hung back dubiously. "What are you going to do with me?"

He eyed the suspicious girl, said solemnly: "Oh, the usual thing."

"The usual thing?" She swallowed. "That's what I was afraid of!"

* * * * *

"You're easily resigned," he observed dryly, and urged her toward the door at the rear of the chamber. "You need to get out of that wet tunic." He grinned, regarded the rent in the back of the garment. "It isn't doing its duty any longer anyway."

"I think you're horrible!" She grabbed the tear together, sidled crabwise through the door, her cheeks hot.

Cosmo followed chuckling. A long narrow corridor burrowed ahead of them straight into the heart of the mountain. Flaring gas jets hissed at regular intervals along the walls.

All at once the grin was wiped from his face. He seized Mia's arm, said: "Hold it!"

Mia bit her lip, gasped.

Three men had edged into the corridor from a bisecting passage. They were huge, almost seven feet tall with skin a vivid blue. They were quite naked and the muscles bulged beneath their blue hides.

"Jovian Dawn Men!" Mia whispered. "My God! They're running amok!"

Cosmo felt the cold breath of death blow up his spine. His hand slid automatically to his shoulder holster. It was empty. With a curse, he remembered that it had been taken by the Blue Venus. Her dart gun, he'd tossed aside, once free of the Bemmelman plantation.

The three naked giants minced daintily closer, nostrils flaring as they caught their scent. "They're not amok," he said over his shoulder. "The rutting season is months off yet. There's something else behind this."

Mia said with incredulity: "Look at their left shoulders. See that scar. The fern leaf! That's Hal Bemmelman's brand! Cosmo, those are Bemmelman's slaves!"

The blue giants crouched. Their violet eyes were passionless, their handsome faces calm, inscrutable.

"Back!" Cosmo suddenly shouted in a tone of authority, and took a step toward them. A low snarl rumbled in their throats. Then like cats on a mouse, they pounced.

Mia screamed.

Cosmo kicked one of them in the belly, heard him grunt. With balled fist he swung at the placid handsome features of the second blue giant. Pain, like a hot iron, shot up his arm from his bruised knuckles. The Jovian shook his head, grabbed Cosmo's wrist, jerked. His arm felt as if it were being torn from the socket.

He kicked, slugged the emotionless face with his free hand. The grip never relaxed. He heard Mia scream again like a rabbit in a steel trap.

Then the Jovian clouted him brutally alongside the temple with his open fist. Cosmo's head snapped sideways like a punching bag. His knees collapsed. He seemed to be falling into the chasm of the waterfall, down, down into stygian blackness.

IV

Cosmo gradually became aware of a jolting swaying movement. At each jolt, a flash of pain shot across his eyes. He sat up, cracked his skull against something solid. A blinding pain jolted him into full consciousness.

He was in a cage, he saw, swung on poles like a litter between two of the blue giants. They were jogging along through a forest.

At once he became aware of warmth along his side, twisted his head. Mia was regarding him from wide frightened eyes. They'd been tumbled side by side into the cage. The girl was almost naked, her yellow tunic in tatters.

"You hurt?" he asked.

She shook her head.

He closed his eyes against the ache in his skull. If the pain would only let up. His mind felt fuzzy, his thoughts incoherent.

"Whew. That brute sure gave me a wallop. What happened?"

He could feel Mia shiver against him. "It was dreadful," she said. "They grabbed me--_ugh!_--and stuffed me in this cage. They had it hidden outside on the trail from the Ormoo's nest. Then they dumped you in on top of me like a bag of flour. I--I thought you were dead."

"So did I," said Cosmo dryly.

She regarded him dubiously, said: "They picked up the cage then and began to run down the trail. They carried us over the most impossible places, always down. I died with fright. Just a little while ago we came out into the forest."

"I know the trail," he said. "Nothing but Jovian primitives could have managed it. I wonder why Bemmelman didn't have me killed outright."

"Bemmelman?" Mia looked puzzled.

"Sure. They're his slaves. You saw the fern leaf brand on their shoulders. We walked straight into a trap."

"But that's impossible. How could they have found your hideout?"

Cosmo shook his head and immediately regretted it. "One of my men must be a spy. Bemmelman's shrewder than I've given him credit for being."

"A spy?" Mia's eyes grew round as saucers. "But why?"

"I don't know. Unless he's after that fifty thousand monad reward on my head!" He frowned. "Bemmelman said something odd last night when he caught me in his house. He said he'd been trying to get in touch with me."

The blue giants swung effortlessly through the incredible forest. The trees were like cathedral columns disappearing in the swirling cloud blanket.

"You said we'd walked into a trap," insisted Mia. "How could Bemmelman know when you'd get back. I don't understand."

Cosmo snorted. "Anybody could guess I'd head for my hideout after the alarm at your place. Most likely, Bemmelman tipped that Judas of his by radio when to expect me. The Dawn Men are animals. They hunt by scent. That fellow must have given them a piece of my clothing, planted them in the corridor. It was as simple as that."

"But what does Bemmelman want with me?" she wailed.

"Don't forget the Blue Venus. I told you he'd been trying to duplicate that experiment."

"I don't believe it," said Mia in a shocked voice. "He wouldn't dare! Would he?"

"What's to hinder him? At Venusport they'll think the Renegade abducted you. Who'd suspect that the eminent Councillor Bemmelman had hijacked me?"

"I don't believe it," she repeated indignantly. "You're just trying to throw mud on him because you think he murdered your parents and stole your plantation. It's--it's an obsession. You have no proof."

Cosmo regarded her with cloudy green eyes. "I had the Intersteller Investigation Bureau dig out his past. I've a man in Bemmelman's household right now. I know." He looked through the bars of the cage. They were approaching the edge of the forest. He turned back, said: "Something besides slave breeding is going on at Bemmelman's. There are parts of the plantation where my man never has been able to penetrate."

"What do you think it is?" Mia's voice was a whisper.

"I don't know. But hasn't it occurred to you that slave breeding must entail a slow turnover. A child isn't marketable until it's sixteen or seventeen at least."

"What are you driving at?"

"Suppose Bemmelman has discovered some way to speed up growth--to hasten maturity."

"An aging process? It's--it's impossible."

He shook his head. "Plants are forced; why not animals?"

The blue giants, he saw, had broken through the last of the trees into a lush meadow of mauve fen grass.

"Look, Mia!" he pointed toward the center of the meadow. "The second lap of our journey is provided for. Our kidnapper shows considerable foresight."

In the center of the meadow, a small surface plane rested on the fen grass like a silver bullet. There was no sign of life inside or out.

* * * * *

"It's deserted," said Mia in surprise. Cosmo frowned, but didn't reply.

The Jovian Dawn Men trotted straight to the empty plane. They opened a door in the side, shoved them within, cage and all. Cosmo heard the door click shut. The Dawn Men had not followed them inside.

He glanced curiously about the interior. All the seats had been removed, even the pilot's chair.

"Where's the pilot?" asked Mia in a subdued voice.

He shook his head. Through the port, he could see the blue giants disappearing among the trees.

Just then the plane gave a jerk.

"It's moving!" With a shriek, Mia flung herself onto Cosmo.

He felt the plane lurch again, then shoot upward. At a hundred feet it leveled itself off, darted away on what he judged to be a southerly course. There was still no evidence of a pilot.

Mia MacIver held onto Cosmo like a drowning man to a straw as the pilotless plane hurtled southward.

He drew a long breath. "Robot pilot." He patted her shoulder. "There's nothing supernatural about it."

Mia pulled herself away. "I didn't mean to throw myself on you like that. I ... I...." She halted lamely.

"Don't apologize." Cosmo flashed her his quick wolfish grin. "I enjoyed it. You've been hurling yourself at me at fairly regular intervals all day."

"I think you're horrid." Mia's cheeks colored, but her gray eyes twinkled.

"Mia," he said serious all at once, "if Bemmelman--er--disposes of me, you'll have to contact my man yourself. I told you I had a spy planted in his household. His name is Penang-ihtok."

She looked suddenly startled.